Boring Diplomacy
by SWFicWriters
Summary: Sequel to 'Going Back in Time'. Eeth and Raven have been assigned the galaxy's most boring mission. Since when have things ever remained boring for our Jedi, though? Warning: This story contains spanking scenes of a non-sexual, disciplinary nature and occasional coarse language. Don't enjoy, don't read. We do not endorse the spanking of real children. This is fiction.
1. Chapter 1

**Chapter One**

A/N: Hi to all who have followed us and to any new faces! We're glad you found us and hope that you enjoy this as much as we have loved creating it.

Our stories originated as online role-playing and are situated in our alternative Star Wars universe – well, mainly the universe of Episode One, pretending that the tragedy of the Great Jedi Purge never happened. Ahem. There are approximately twenty-five stories pre-written in this series which focuses on Master Eeth Koth and his padawan learner Raven Trebeck. Although each story can stand alone, it might be a better reading experience to start from the beginning with "Of Padawans Fake and True".

'Boring Diplomacy', the sequel to 'Going Back in Time', is set two months after Eeth and Raven returned from their mission to collect a Force-sensitive child from Nar Shaddaa. After reluctantly spending time with a soul healer, Eeth has reinstated their mission status although, and much to his padawan's displeasure, he downgraded the difficulty level. In Boring Diplomacy, Raven will face new challenges, while Eeth … well, unpleasant things are going to happen to Eeth. We're not giving away any more than this for now.

Alright, now for a little Boring Diplomacy of our own. As everyone who has read and followed our stories ought to know by now, authority and discipline are central themes. To any newcomers, see the aforementioned statement and take it as your only warning. We don't post content warnings at the beginning of each chapter for this. Also, we realise that our master characters, especially Eeth, will at times come across as harsh. However, please keep in mind that this is a fictional universe in which teenagers with extraordinary, potentially lethal abilities are raised to do an incredibly hard, dangerous and responsible job. Their masters feel an obligation to keep them in line in order to protect them and others by various types of discipline, including corporal punishment, i.e., spanking with the hand and different implements. And sometimes, they will need to dispense with the cuddling and tell their charges to do their duty. These are teenagers, after all, not small children. There will always be times to offer comfort and moments of closeness between master and padawan, but they might sometimes have to wait. Plus, masters might have their own issues … which is certainly true for Eeth. His journey with Raven is a learning experience for him as much as for his padawan.

Fortunately for our padawans, our master characters have near-magical healing abilities at their disposal, allowing us to indulge our preference for strict discipline. All of our stories are well-thought-out and contain in-depth character development and progression of the storyline.

If you like our stories (or if you don't like them for reasons other than those of which you have been warned), let us know in a review; we love to hear what you guys think. Okay, let's get this show on the road. Enjoy.

* * *

"Watch out, watch outtt!" Raven shouted as an elderly Jedi master walked out in front of her, momentarily blocking her mad dash for the stairs because ultimately, taking the stairs was going to be faster than the turbolifts. She had just finished with what had to be the most disastrous maths exam in the history of her padawanhood, been caught up talking to Bindi about Orion and now she might be late for her afternoon training session with Eeth. Yeah, not today, not if she could help it! She vaulted over the Jedi master, almost taking his head off in the process but managing to miss him all the same. "I'm sorry! Sorreeee! This is a matter of life or death, really!" Raven called to the now frowning man. It was true, too, because if she were late again, Eeth was going to murder her. Okay, okay, so perhaps "murder" was a little drastic, but whatever he chose to do would be suitably hideous, that much was certain. The thought of copping it and having to train with a sore ass inspired the girl to pick up the pace as she raced into the next hallway.

A lot had happened in the two months since their return from Nar Shaddaa. Eeth had not relented in his decision to assign his padawan to creche duty each Sunday. What neither of them had anticipated, however, was that not only did Raven enjoy interacting with the children, but they liked having her around, too! That said, she was still not keen on changing diapers and had gotten into a few arguments with Master Shelda over Eeth's 'taking it in turns' method which apparently, was not going to fly with the dark-skinned crèche master. That aside, she had managed to keep her nose clean and was pleased to see the end of this class cycle as it would allow her to get rid of maths in lieu of something else – provided she passed her end-of-term exam. Yeah, about that exam. Maths was not a subject that Raven had ever found easy, yet this wasn't the only reason she had done so badly on the exam. The teacher was an asshole, pure and simple. That, in conjunction with the fact that Eeth had seen fit to entrust her with organising her own studies, due to the satisfactory results she had scored during the past few terms, meant that Raven had not exactly studied as much as she might have made out. In fact, she had studied just enough to pass, nothing more. Or she thought she had, although if the difficulty she'd had completing the exam was anything to go by, a pass was going to be a welcome surprise.

All this and more ran through Raven's mind as she dashed around the final bend, skidding to a stop just outside their assigned training room. Four-thirty on the dot! Okay, so now she needed to compose herself. Today had been shitty enough without being busted for something as trivial as breaking basic Temple rules. Running in the corridors was strictly forbidden and Raven, who had a tendency to run late, knew this better than most. Once her breathing had returned to normal, she rearranged her tunic, straightened her ponytail and relaxed: she had this in the bag!

Eeth was already inside, waiting for Raven and hoping for her sake that she would manage to be on time. He had some news for her but that was, of course, no reason for them to skip their workout!

Eeth had spent quite a lot of time during the past two months working with a rather determined and persistent soul healer. The insights he had gained during these sessions had only confirmed his conviction that he had tried to accomplish too much, too fast, for ultimately selfish motives, and that they would be better off restarting their fieldwork slowly and at a safer pace. He had not told Raven much about these sessions; it was a subject that tended to make him quite uncomfortable, starting with the fact that he needed them at all. It might come up when he informed Raven of the mission they had been assigned, though; he had little doubt that his padawan would be less than thrilled when she heard about the details… provided she ever showed up for their workout!

Eeth was just glancing at the chronometre impatiently when Raven entered the training room, right on time. "Master," she greeted with a bow.

"Padawan," Eeth replied solemnly, returning her bow. He scrutinised her for a few seconds, noticing her flushed face, and asked, "Have you been running in order to arrive here on time?"

"Now how the Force did he know that? I mean, really, how?!" Raven thought, but despite her outwardly managed to keep it together. "What makes you think that?" she countered cooly, doing her best to conceal any guilt that might be pouring off her.

Her best was, of course, not quite sufficient to deceive a Jedi of Eeth's calibre. More importantly, Eeth refused to be distracted. Raising his eyebrows, he asked pointedly, "Did you or did you not?"

"Is running the same as sprinting?" Raven thought frantically, but she did not have time to weigh the pros and cons as a loud, deliberate cough drew her attention to the door where the man she'd almost mowed over was now standing.

"So, padawan, this is the life or death situation worth running an old man down?" he said, a hint of humour twinkling in knowing eyes as he met the gaze of one ticked-off councillor. "Master Koth," he greeted with a nod, and then he smiled sympathetically and left the girl to her fate.

Raven stared at the empty door for a long moment before dragging her gaze back to Eeth. "He's actually a lot sturdier than he looks, honest!"

"Padawan, this will very soon become a life-or-death situation if you continue this kind of behaviour," Eeth snapped. "When you make a mistake, you own up to it, rather than look for excuses. Running in the corridor is forbidden, as you well know, and the fact that you apparently ran down Master Haotvar is a case in point."

He nodded towards one of the benches that lined the gym.

"Bend over," he ordered, and his tone of voice made it clear that he was not going to tolerate any further nonsense. Nor was he willing to waste more of their training time; they might not have access to an actual gym for the next week or so, after all, not that Raven had any way of knowing this.

Just when Raven thought this day could get no worse! "Masterrr!" she whined, all the while moving to stand where he had motioned. "I'm sorry, really I am, but you would have walloped me for sure if I had been late again," she said earnestly, shooting him a truly piteous expression before turning to face the bench.

"Oh yes, most definitely," Eeth said firmly, pulling his paddle out of his belt. "But when I expect you to be on time, that does not mean I want you to race through the Temple corridors running over your fellow Jedi, as I am quite sure you are aware of. I leave it to you to think of appropriate ways to make it to your appointments on time. Should something unforeseeable happen that makes a delay inevitable and prevents you from informing me of it, I will always listen, of course. Was that the case today?"

Was that the case? Raven chewed at her lip while contemplating this. It had been unforeseeable alright. In fact, the padawan was still caught between feelings of shock and amusement at receiving this particular piece of information.

"Yes, master, it was definitely unforeseeable," Raven replied, although she had to wonder if telling Eeth that Bindi finally admitted to having a crush on Orion would appeal to the man's almost non-existent sense of humour, or if it would simply earn her more swats for being a smartass. Raven suspected the latter but considered it a worthwhile risk and started explaining.

"So you see, master," the padawan concluded. "I just had to get the whole story." By now she was facing him again, a hopeful expression on her face.

"I see," Eeth replied, stony-faced. "Obviously, I did not express myself clearly. Let me repeat myself. Should something unforeseeable happen that makes a delay INEVITABLE and prevents you from informing me of it, I will always listen. The reason you have just presented does not fall into that category. Unless your friend tied you to a chair and forced you to stay and listen, I do not consider it a valid excuse. Now bend over. I do not want to waste more time on this than absolutely necessary."

He gestured towards the bench, paddle in hand.

Had it been one of her friends or classmates, Raven was quite certain they would have either wet themselves or started crying. As it was, however, Raven was all too familiar with Eeth's intimidating side and did her best to stand tall and not squirm as he elaborated. "Yep, that went down like a lead balloon," she thought, trying to swallow without looking like it was an effort. By the time Eeth had uttered the dreaded command for a second time, Raven had on her most piteous expression. That said, she was utterly unwilling to compound her problems by sulking, so with a curt nod, she turned to the bench and bent over; this was going to suck.

Eeth let Raven keep her trousers on, mainly because he did not want to waste any more time than strictly necessary on this. They had already lost five minutes of their training time.

Thus, he swung the paddle with enough force to be felt through pants and underwear, a dozen solid swats in rapid succession. Raven was going to go through kata practice with a rather sore bottom today; but then, her tendency to run late had brought her into trouble more than once, and she knew very well what to expect for it. Eeth was determined to cure her of this bad habit before she was knighted.

Oh, Force! Trousers or no trousers, thought Raven, Eeth was not messing around – not that he ever did! The hail of smacks raining down on her ass provided absolutely no time whatsoever for recovery and consequently, the first few barely had time to register. Unfortunately, that reprieve was short-lived, and by the seventh swat Raven swore blind that she would never sit again, ever! Rising up on her toes, she dug her fingernails into the bench, twisted, writhed, wailed and, much to her horror, eventually started sniffling. By the time the final few landed, the only thing stopping her from trying to force him to stop by buckling at the knees was the likely repercussions of trying that on. "Can I get up now, please?" she asked, after clearing her throat; she did not want to look like a crèche baby but at the same time, fuck! Did it hurt!

"Yes, you may," Eeth said evenly, stowing the paddle back into its place in his belt. "But be warned, padawan. The next time you show up late for practice or have to knock people over in order to arrive in time, you will not only receive a sore bottom, but you will also spend a lot of time sitting on that sore bottom writing lines. Now let us get started on kata practice. Do you need to warm up, or have you done enough running?"

Raven heeded his warning, she always did! It was just that sometimes it was hard to obey them all. Raven had once suggested that it might be easier on her if he didn't have so many rules, but that had gone over rather badly. "I'm warm," she replied, still rubbing as she followed him into the first kata. At least performing kata was not going to have her running all over the gym: small mercies. Nevertheless, Raven went through that session with a sore ass, and when they found a seat in the dining hall for dinner some time later, she was working not to squirm in her seat. "Mind if I stand?" Raven asked bluntly. It hadn't been the worst paddling she'd ever gotten, not by a long shot, but that didn't mean it was comfortable.

"You, padawan," said Eeth stoically, "will remain seated." The paddling he had dealt out had been sound, but less harsh than it might have been. After all, he had been perfectly aware that Raven would have to endure a workout and subsequent dinner without much of a chance for relief. Sitting on her sore bottom might just increase her motivation to arrive at her appointments on time!

Raven frowned at him, but that was as far as she was taking that protest.

"Finish your dinner," Eeth said mildly when he noticed her pushing her food around, like usual. "I have got some news to tell you."

Disinclined to fight him over this (she had had her fair share of dining hall humiliation in the past), Raven obeyed, picking up her fork. His statement, however, had her curious. "You do? Is it the good kind of news, or the bad kind of news?" Raven wanted to know. Given the way her day had gone so far, there was a good reason for such paranoia, after all.

"It depends on one's point of view, I suppose," Eeth replied, earning a pointed look from his padawan. "As far as you are concerned," he elaborated, unperturbed, "it is probably mixed news. The good news is that we are leaving on a mission tomorrow morning. The bad news is that you might not find this particular mission to be… well, of a type that conforms to your wildest dreams. I will moderate the biannual hyperspace communications frequencies conference on Borleias, and you will accompany me."

The biannual hyperspace communications frequencies conference was widely acclaimed to be among the most boring missions a Jedi could acquire. Eeth had attended it twice, once as a padawan and once as a young knight, and while he had carried out his tasks dutifully, he could not honestly claim that the experience had held any appeal. Obviously, the Council had taken his request to be assigned less dangerous missions seriously. On the plus side, Borleias had beautiful jungles and beaches that might offer Raven some distraction once their work was done; and it was only a couple of hours of spaceship travel away from Coruscant.

"The biannual hyperspace communications frequencies conference? What a mouthful. What is that about? And, please tell me that it's more interesting than the name suggests," she stated, lowering her fork to the plate in dramatised horror.

"Unfortunately," Eeth said drily, "that would be a blatant lie. Every two years, delegates from the Republic, from independent planets and the Trade Federation meet and discuss the distribution of hyperspace communications frequencies for official and commercial purposes. It used to be a subject of great conflict, centuries ago, which is why the Jedi were asked to chair the meetings. There is no real need for that any more these days; it is more of a tradition. Usually, it involves three to four days of going through countless files and collecting everyone's votes while defusing the occasional squabble. To answer your question: Yes, it is exactly as boring as it sounds, and then some. But someone has to do it and this time around, it will be us. Thus, I expect your best effort."

"You have got to be joking?" He was joking. Force, he wasn't joking! "Why are you doing this? Are you punishing me for something? Because if you are, I personally think it is rather harsh, even for you." Despite her words, the expression Raven met him with was far too genuine to be mistaken for sarcasm.

"Padawan, it was not my decision, it was the Council administration's," said Eeth calmly. "I admit that when I made the request to be assigned a diplomatic mission next, this was not exactly what I had expected, nor would it have been my first choice… or my second or third, for that matter."

"It may not be your choice, master, but it is your fault! If you hadn't insisted on busting us down to baby missions, the Council wouldn't have assigned us the most boring mission in the galaxy."

"It might be boring," said Eeth coolly, "but it is not a 'baby mission.' I was a knight when I last undertook it. I assure you, nobody has ever died of boredom during these conferences, so I am fairly confident that you will survive, too."

"Nobody has died _yet_," the padawan corrected him, a finger poised to punctuate her point. Raven wasn't so sure she would want to survive it. Was death preferable to sitting around in a conference all day? Hmm, it was probably a tad drastic.

Eeth did not dignify that with a response. "It will only be for a few days, anyway," he said. "Besides, Borleias is quite a pleasant place, as conference sites go. If you manage to behave yourself, I might extend our stay by an extra day or two so we can explore the jungle and the beaches."

"I'm sure it's great," the padawan replied in a deadpan tone. Even the mention of jungles and beaches didn't make her muster enthusiasm in the face of days spent sitting in a conference.

"It is," said Eeth. "If you do not believe me, ask Lakhri. He has never done the hyperspace communication frequencies conference but he has been to Borleias for other diplomatic functions several times. Now finish your dinner. We need to pack. We are leaving tomorrow morning."

"Yes, master," the Padawan relented, picking up her fork. This mission was going to be a nightmare! Well, there wasn't a lot that could be done about it, and so Raven finished her dinner without further complaint.

During the walk back to their quarters, Raven took it upon herself to ask a few questions about Borleias in the hopes that perhaps it might spark some interest. The opportunity to explore the jungles and beaches did actually appeal to her, even if the conference was kinda a buzz kill. "Maybe we could explore in the afternoons or something," she suggested, thinking that it might help to offset the boredom.

"Doubtful," Eeth replied as he entered their quarters and hung up his cloak. "It will be our task to set up the schedule once we are there, together with the chief delegates. Thus, we have no way of knowing yet whether we will have a free afternoon. But normally the participants are keen to get this over with quickly and tend to opt for three full days, rather than four days with more free time. Trips to the jungle might have to wait until the end of the conference – that is if you behave yourself. We might have some time to visit the beach after our arrival if we manage to set up the scheduling quickly."

"Oh joy, I can hardly wait," replied Raven, deadpan.

"Pack your things, padawan," Eeth said mildly.

Raven sighed but obeyed nevertheless. She had latched on to the one positive of that statement, being that apparently, the others weren't keen on dragging it out either. That was a bonus, even if it meant longer days.

* * *

"I packed formal robes and that mission prep bag, will I need anything else?" Raven asked, emerging from her bedroom some time later. She threw a glance at their comm unit, wishing for all she was worth that the Council would suddenly require their services elsewhere. Why not? It could happen. She would check it before bed and again first thing in the morning, just in case.

"Did you pack your swimsuit?" Eeth called from his room where he was finishing his own packing.

In the meantime, Lakhri, who was on his way back from the gym, decided to see whether his former master and Raven were home. He pressed the door chime, leaned against the door frame and waited, his face still a little flushed from his workout and his hair wet and tousled from the shower.

"Yes, and I'll get it," Raven replied. She noticed their comm unit light up as she went for the door and she quickly raced back to see if it was a reassignment. It could be! Unfortunately, Raven's bad day was probably about to get worse as it was the results from this afternoon's maths exam. She suppressed a groan and just prayed to any deity that might be listening that she had somehow managed to pull a pass out of her ass. It could happen! She had done SOME study, after all.

"Heya, Lakhri!" she greeted her Jedi brother, giving him a broad smile and forgetting about her shitty day as she hugged him. Raven had grown a bit over the last few months and subsequently, she now had a slight height advantage on him; a fact that she tried to exploit at every opportunity, not that it ever did her any good. "Were you at the pools?" she asked, noticing his wet hair.

"No, I took a shower after my workout and was too lazy to dry my hair," said Lakhri, following her inside. "How are you doing?"

Raven shrugged. She was hesitant to start going on about the crappy day she'd had, given that he had only just arrived and all. "As good as can be expected considering that Eeth is currently busy packing for the galaxy's most boring mission. Do you want to go give him a hard time about it? I think I've reached my quota of acceptable complaining for today," she said, wandering into the kitchen to get him a glass of water.

"The galaxy's most boring mission?" Lakhri said. "Don't say you've been assigned the hyperspace communications frequencies conference."

"We have," Eeth said dryly, emerging into the common room. "Good evening, Lakhri. It is good to see you."

Raven opened her arms wide and met both Jedi with an incredulous, owlish expression; Force, even Lakhri knew this mission by reputation!

"Hello, Eeth," Lakhri said with a broad grin. "What did the two of you do to deserve that fate, lay fire to the Council chamber?"

"Very funny," Eeth replied with dignity. "As a matter of fact, and as my padawan does not tire of reminding me, I did request to be scheduled for diplomatic missions. I did not exactly request the hyperspace communication frequencies conference nor was it high on my list of priorities but I daresay we will survive. Have you checked the comm, padawan? I heard it chime a minute ago."

"Umm, yeah, it's just some stuff about classes," Raven answered vaguely before turning her attention back to Lakhri. "I am going to be the mission's first fatality; if the boredom doesn't make me throw myself on my saber, I'm pretty sure the paperwork will do the trick!"

Eeth's eyes narrowed in suspicion. When his padawan talked of "stuff about classes" this nonchalantly, there was almost certainly something wrong, especially considering the fact that today's exam results were due. He had noticed that morning already that his padawan had felt less than confident about the maths exam, despite her efforts to pretend otherwise. Eeth's decision to give her free reign with regard to her study and homework had largely worked out, so far. He just hoped that maths – Raven's most hated subject – would not prove to be the exception to the rule because he had made it quite clear that he expected Raven to tell him well before the exam when she had trouble with any class so he could help her avoid a fail grade before it was too late.

While he stalked off to the comm unit in order to find out what was going on, Lakhri grinned at Raven and flopped down on the couch.

"I can sympathise," he said. "Force knows I felt like throwing myself on my saber when Eeth made me assist him in chairing a Senate committee on taxation laws. Needless to say, I am still alive, but boy, there were times at which I felt death would have been preferable. Where's the conference, anyway?"

"Borleias" she replied, tracking Eeth's path towards their comm unit with her eyes. Yep, the shit was probably going to hit the fan.

"Anything has to be better than this communications garbage, though. I mean, it's even got a reputation for boredom. Anyway, what has the Council got you doing next cycle? Are you teaching or are they kicking you out so that we aren't busted back to ration packs?" Raven teased, all the while trying to monitor Eeth's reaction.

"Mostly teaching," Lakhri replied. "And some paperwork. I'm coaching a few newly-knighted Jedi in their mission preparation. In any case, I will definitely get to stay at the Temple and pillage your food stores for two more months. I've been assigned five different classes for the upcoming cycle so I'll have my hands full."

"Speaking of classes," Eeth said, emerging from behind the comm unit with a rather stony face, "the result of your maths exam has just arrived. You received a D- which means, as you are probably aware, that you will have to drop your optional subject next term and take remedial maths instead. How could you allow this to happen, padawan?"

Okay, so this was not scraping by with a pass or slight fail as she had anticipated, this was an outright plummet into the depths of oblivion; there were freakin' Sarlacc down here! Typically, Raven managed a solid C in maths which Eeth was satisfied with given her lack of natural aptitude for the subject. But a D-! That was a first for any subject, ever. Raven stood from her seat opposite Lakhri and fidgeted while trying to think of something to tell him. The truth was probably not going to go over well, yet there was nothing else even remotely plausible that would fly. What could she possibly say? Nothing. Resigned, the padawan let out an exasperated sigh, allowing her hands to flop to her sides. "Master Vantachi is a complete jerk; he has it in for me."

"Padawan, this is your own abysmal exam result, not his," Eeth said severely, drawing a withering look from his padawan, which did not impress him in the least. "A little more effort at studying, and you could have easily avoided such a disastrous outcome. A D+ would have sufficed for you to stay out of the remedial class, and a straight C would have meant you would have had the choice to drop the subject altogether. Are you honestly going to tell me that you studied enough? That you did all you could to prepare for the exam?"

If Raven's discomfort didn't supply Eeth with the answer to that question, then the drawn-out silence would have surely done the trick.

"Padawan," said Eeth in a dangerously quiet tone of voice, "I told you to come to me when you have difficulties with a subject. I also reminded you to study for this exam just about every day for the last two weeks, and you told me you would. Did you honestly believe that you were doing just fine in maths, or did you neglect telling me about your difficulties because that would have meant I would have made you study, which you did not want to do? I expect you to answer this question. Now."

Had she believed all was well in maths? Well, yeah, kind of. Raven could achieve a passing grade if she put her mind to it; she had done so since having become Eeth's apprentice, after all. This was more a case of personal hatred for the subject, a personality clash with her teacher and the fact that it was easier to slack off when Eeth was not riding her as much. Yeah, admitting to any of that was not going to be easy.

"I thought that if I put in just enough effort not to draw attention to myself in classes, I'd be able to do the same with the exam. Plus, you know I hate maths at the best of times, let alone having to put up with an incognito Sith Lord for a teacher." She glanced at Lakhri briefly, but the man looked as if he'd rather be anywhere but here. Well, Raven couldn't blame him for that as she totally agreed with him.

"I think we have already established that whether you hate maths or not is entirely irrelevant," said Eeth icily. "Moreover, you know perfectly well that putting in the barest minimum of effort is not what I expect of you, regardless of who is teaching you. If this is what happens when I give you some leeway with regard to your studies, I will not make that mistake again. Rest assured that you will pass your remedial maths class with flying colours because you will spend every free moment studying maths until you do."

"Wait, what? Every free moment? You can't be serious?"

"Of course I am serious," said Eeth sternly. "You neglected to study before the exam, you suffered the consequences, and now you will have to make up for your neglect. Do you honestly believe I will allow you to run even the slightest risk of failing your remedial maths class, too?"

Raven looked positively stricken. The prospect of spending all of her free time studying maths was horrifying enough in theory, so the reality was going to be an absolute nightmare. "Please, master, can't I skip it, just for one term! I need a break from it, is all." But what Raven really wanted to say was that she needed a break from master Vantachi!

"You," snapped Eeth, "will take remedial maths next cycle. Master Vantachi is kind enough to teach the class to you and two others who failed the exam. And it is your own fault that you belong to that group, not Master Vantachi's."

Raven froze at this news, her mouth falling open. This had to be the worst day of her life to date! After a moment spent in shock, Raven finally found her voice. "No, please not with Master Vantachi! The man has issues!" She gestured to Lakhri with a hand. "Even Lakhri says that the man had a hot poker jammed up his ass at birth, and has spent a lifetime with it up there which is why he acts like a complete jerk!"

Lakhri cringed and tried to make himself as small as possible. It was true; he distinctly remembered that one night in the dining hall where he had spent a happy hour with Raven abusing some of the more obnoxious teachers. In hindsight, that might not have been one of his smartest ideas.

"Lakhri's valuable assessment notwithstanding," said Eeth frostily, throwing his former padawan a scathing look, "you will do Master Vantachi's class as often as it takes for you to pass. May I suggest that you pass it the next time? You would save all of us, especially yourself, an inordinate amount of time and effort if you did."

"Well, if I failed a second time, you would have to agree that it is him and not me," Raven stated matter-of-factly, still in shock. How the Force she was going to make it through another cycle with that asshole was beyond her.

Eeth's expression darkened. "I would not have to do anything of that sort," he said even more frostily. "Master Vantachi does not fail students for no reason at all. He fails them for showing no competence in his subject. Just to be on the safe side, though, I could ask him to send me your exam paper so we can go through it together and see whether you demonstrated more skill at maths than he gave you credit for. Is that what you want me to do?"

Raven was of two minds here. Firstly, she truly believed that the jackass had it in for her and perhaps there was something to be gained from having Eeth check it over. Then again, did she really want Eeth privy to exactly how badly she had done to warrant that D-? Probably not. The padawan pursed her lips, decision made. "Actually, yes. If you could look over it, I would be okay with that," she decided and hoped to the Force that she was right about this!

"Alright," said Eeth coolly. "If it turns out that your D- was as well-deserved as I suspect it was, though, that will just mean I will make doubly sure you spend all your free time studying. Your level of competence in maths will be up to standard by the end of the next cycle, one way or another."

With a grim expression on his face, he sat back down at the terminal to write a message to Master Vantachi, requesting him to send Raven's exam paper.

Raven inclined her head in response. That Eeth wasn't thrilled about this had been expected and the consequences, although entirely harsh if you asked her, were equally kinda expected. Slumping back into the chair opposite Lakhri, the padawan dragged her hands down her face and sighed. "As if being lumped with the galaxy's shittiest mission were not bad enough, now I have every waking moment filled with maths to look forward to. The universe is out to get me today! What next? Bird pox?" She looked at Lakhri through splayed fingers.

Eeth had heard this and his grim look turned into an outright glare. Before he could say something, Lakhri intervened. "For the Force's sake, keep your mouth shut, Raven, or I can tell you exactly what the next unpleasant thing in your life is going to be," he told Raven. "Don't you recognise that look? I think I'd better take some time to help you study maths in the next cycle so you can finally get rid of it and save yourself the trouble."

Raven looked from Lakhri to where Eeth was sitting at their terminal, glaring. Okay, so it was bad enough taking them on individually, but having them both mad at her at once was simply suicidal. "I'm sorry, master," the padawan offered, attempting damage control and feeling ashamed at being told off by both of them. She wanted to thank Lakhri for offering to help with maths, but was unwilling to say anything more about it for the moment.

"Apology accepted," Eeth said, but he was not quite placated. The expression on his face said clearly that his padawan was treading on very thin ice. "I think that some help with maths would be an excellent idea, Lakhri," he told the younger knight. "If you were willing to sacrifice some time for this, I would be truly grateful. You are a very good teacher."

"Thanks for the compliment," Lakhri replied with a grin. "I'll be happy to work with Raven."

If they could agree on nothing else this evening, Raven could not fault Eeth's statement: Lakhri really was a great teacher. He was patient enough to make it bearable while being firm enough to keep her from slacking off. Besides, it would be fun to spend time with him, even if it was maths.

"Well, at least," Lakhri said, turning towards Raven, "the conference site is fantastic. It is bound to be the congress hall at Delta Beach. It's the only place large enough on the planet. Delta Beach is incredible. I've been there twice, including that one trade negotiation where the Tassillian jurists drove everyone insane – remember, Eeth?"

"Yes," Eeth said, raising his eyebrows. "And I will not say out loud what you called the Head of the Tassilian delegation when your patience reached its limits."

Lakhri grinned. "He deserved it. Yes, I know, it was totally inappropriate and you made that abundantly clear to me, but the head of the Amaroose delegation used the incident to express his own displeasure with the proceedings, and after that, we reached an agreement a lot faster than anyone would have thought possible."

"Furthermore, they now know that some Jedi swear worse than space miners," Eeth commented somewhat sternly. "Knowledge they could have very well done without."

Interest piqued, Raven met Lakhri with a curious expression. "So because you called him out, the proceedings went faster?" she wanted to clarify.

"Yes," said Lakhri, and "No!" said Eeth simultaneously. Lakhri burst out laughing, and even Eeth had to smile.

"Well, maybe in that case, a little," Eeth conceded.

"Or maybe it would have happened all the same if I had phrased my criticism more politely," Lakhri admitted.

Raven rolled her eyes at their backpedalling. "But you don't know that for sure. Everything happens for a reason, or so they say," she countered, grinning slightly so that they would not think she was being serious – not entirely.

"That is no reason not to blame people for the outcome of their actions," Eeth said decisively. "Any action may have unforeseen consequences, and anything might happen for a reason, but if I followed that logic, I would have to allow you to get away with absolutely everything. And that would be absurd. Lakhri did not curse the delegate because he wanted to make a constructive contribution to the proceedings, he cursed him because the man was getting on his nerves and he lost his patience. And that is unacceptable behaviour in a Jedi, no matter the outcome."

Personally, Raven thought that getting away with everything sounded pretty good, especially so given the crapshoot she had landed herself in today. She wisely kept that thought to herself, though, and simply nodded instead.

"As you can see," said Lakhri, "I cannot recommend following my great example. Eeth wouldn't be happy if you did."

"As if I would. I never tick off my master, you of all people should know that," said Raven, her grin pulling into a smile.

"There will hardly be any need for that during the hyperspace communications frequencies conference," Eeth said dryly. "These are routine proceedings."

"You sure you don't want to go to these routine proceedings instead? I'll totally let you, really," the padawan offered, looking at Lakhri.

"Padawan, you are attending the conference, and that is final," Eeth said very firmly.

"Yes, I'm sure it will be very educational," Lakhri quipped. "I've had my share of valuable learning experiences, thank you very much. I would not mind the beaches, though."

Eeth pointed a glare at him, and Lakhri laughed. "Yes, I know. Lazing about on the beach: despicable! And yet, you'll indulge your padawan if she asks nicely, won't you?"

"We will see," Eeth said stiffly.

Lakhri winked at Raven and got up. "Well, I'll leave you to your preparations, then," he said cheerfully. "I hope you packed a swimsuit, Raven."

"I did," Raven replied, although after the whole maths clusterfuck, she wasn't sure if Eeth was going to let her do anything fun ever again. Well, she'd have to cross that bridge when they came to it. For now, she hugged Lakhri goodbye. "Thanks for offering to help me with the maths. At least you'll make it somewhat bearable to study."

"You're welcome," Lakhri replied with a grin. "I hesitate to say 'enjoy yourselves' because mentioning enjoyment in the same breath as the hyperspace communication frequencies conference sounds kind of silly, but maybe you do get to have a swim. By the way, Eeth, swimming in the ocean can be an educational experience for your padawan. You shouldn't deny it to her."

"Yes, well, I am not making any promises," Eeth said pointedly. "It was good to see you, Lakhri. I expect we will be back in five to six days. Seven at most."

"I'll see you in a week's time, then," said Lakhri cheerfully. He waved them goodbye and left.

"Alright, padawan. Bed," Eeth said promptly.

Utterly unwilling to give him any reason to become prickly, Raven gave a slight bow and did as told. The next cycle was going to be a nightmare, but right now it had to get in line, as they were embarking on an even bigger nightmare tomorrow morning.


	2. Chapter 2

The next morning came all too quickly for Raven. She was in a deep sleep, dreaming of fighting off Sith Lords, pirates and bad guys in general when Eeth activated the lighting in her bedroom, blinding the twelve-year-old into semi-alertness. "Arghno!" she complained, yet scrambled to her feet to demonstrate compliance lest Eeth start threatening her with cold showers, or worse, buckets of water.

"Get dressed, please," said Eeth matter-of-factly. "I want to discuss your exam paper with you over breakfast. Master Vantachi sent it late last night."

"Ohh…" Raven didn't sound enthusiastic, and once Eeth had left her room, she slid onto her belly and flopped onto the floor. She hated mornings at the best of times, but with a discussion on her failed maths exam pending, and their departure for the galaxy's most boring mission, aka the hyperspace communications frequencies conference, locked in at half past eight, Raven wasn't keen to begin her day.

Yet twenty-five minutes later, Raven entered their common room to find Eeth placing a pot of tea on their dining room table. "Master," she greeted him, offering a curt bow. She felt a stab of guilt at realising that Eeth had not only made them a full breakfast, but he had also done her job and set the table. She dumped her pack on the floor and sat.

"Eat, padawan," said Eeth. "We might meditate after breakfast if there is still time; otherwise, it will have to wait until after our arrival. We will take a passenger ship from the central spaceport. The trip only takes two hours."

Raven nodded, taking a piece of toast from the plate and digging her knife into some cheese. "So, is there anything that I need to know about this conference that you haven't already told me? And I really do mean 'need to know'."

"Not much," Eeth replied dryly, spreading some cheese onto his bread. "We will go through it on the trip and after our arrival, if need be. Essentially, we have received thousands of pages of lists. During the conference, we will go through them together with the delegates. Proposed changes and additions have been marked, and we will need to either get everyone's approval or an alternative for any proposed change or addition. When we have completed all the lists, the conference is over. That is about all there is to know."

"Thousands of pages… That's," she sighed, "that's just great." The blank, unenthusiastic expression she aimed his way was unmistakable, yet entirely warranted if you asked her.

"It is what it is," Eeth said stoically. "Speaking of which… the same is true for your exam paper."

He placed a datapad in front of her that contained a lot of questions and very few answers, none of which were completely correct and most of which were completely wrong.

"Please explain to me why you think that Master Vantachi should not have given you a D- for this," he said.

Raven looked at the datapad, swiped through the first couple of pages and winced. It was actually worse than she remembered. "Okay, so maybe it was warranted. That doesn't make him any less of an ass."

"Whether or not he seems likeable to you is completely beside the point," said Eeth sharply. "The point is that you obviously did not study for the exam, and I cannot imagine that you did much work during last cycle either or you would have learned more than this. I told you to come to me well before the exam if you had trouble with any subject. It should have been clear to you that this was the case with maths. Why did you not talk to me about this?"

"And tell you what? That I hate the subject, hate the teacher and I'm doing my very best to do just enough to pass so I get a cycle off?" Raven sounded incredulous, but her expression was pained.

"Precisely," said Eeth coldly, "Rest assured that I would have provided you with sufficient motivation to study, despite your dislike of the subject and teacher, and you would have passed the exam with an acceptable grade. You, however, preferred to disobey my instructions. Moreover, you must have employed considerable ingenuity to deceive your teacher over the extent of your ignorance in all the subjects he was trying to teach you, else he certainly would have contacted me well before the exam. That ingenuity would have been better spent on finding ways to achieve the goals of the class. In short, you were dishonest as well as disobedient. You know what I think of that, padawan."

"Yes, but even if I didn't, having to spend every moment of my free time doing maths would clue me in." Raven said, a hint of caution in her tone. She didn't like the way this conversation was going.

Eeth's mouth tightened into a firm line. "Having seen the extent of your laziness, deceit and disobedience first-hand," he said sternly, gesturing at the datapad, "I think that the lesson needs some reinforcement. Eat up. When you are done, I am going to provide you with a reminder of my expectations. You will think long and hard before you decide to slack off again in this subject."

Okay, so that announcement was about as welcome as finding out that she was taking remedial math with Vansithlord! "Master, you can't mean what I think you mean? You're already making me spend all my free time on maths, which is way harsh. I swear that you don't need to reinforce anything because I know that what I did was wrong. I won't do anything like it again."

"I would rather make sure," said Eeth. "Eat up."

He was not planning on making this an excruciating punishment; after all, she would have to carry the effects around with her during a spaceship trip to Borleias later that morning, even if it was a short trip. Still, when he was seriously displeased, this was the way he brought his displeasure across, and he did not want to make an exception this time. He might even have done this last night, had Lakhri not come along; but that was no reason to relinquish his standards, he felt.

Raven groaned but did as instructed, not that she had much of an appetite after his announcement. It felt like her life got progressively worse with each passing minute!

When both of them were done eating, Eeth pushed back his chair, pulled his paddle out of his belt and said, "Come here. Bare your bottom and get over my lap."

Huffing, Raven pushed her plate away and rose. "Masterrrr, please be reasonable about this," she whined while dragging her feet to his side where she stood and started unbuckling her belt.

"Oh, I am," said Eeth grimly, earning himself a pained expression from his padawan. He waited for her to get into position, secured her with his left arm and brought the paddle down onto her bottom with his right. They did not have much time; therefore he spanked faster than he usually did, in a staccato of ringing swats.

Raven managed to grunt and hiss her way through the first half dozen, but that was about the extent of her bravado. She had never seen the point of toughing out punishment with Eeth; it wasn't like stoicism made him stop sooner even if she was able to fake it. "Ahh! P-please! I'm sorry!" she complained when he didn't stop after six; she had hoped it was only going to be a short reminder!

Unperturbed, Eeth continued, completing the dozen but not stopping at that. This was only the small paddle, after all. Not that Raven could tell the difference at the moment; her ass was on fire! "Masterrr!" She wailed through her tears. Yet when this failed to elicit any reaction from Eeth, Raven fell limp and started howling in earnest.

At this point, Eeth stopped the paddling. Unhurried, he helped Raven up and stowed the paddle back into his belt.

"Alright," said Eeth matter-of-factly as he found a handkerchief in his pocket and gave it to her. "Take five minutes to compose yourself. I will clear the table in the meantime. Then we will meditate, and then we will leave for the spaceport."

Raven swiped at her face with the handkerchief and blew her nose. The idea of meditating now didn't exactly appeal; Force, neither did their shuttle trip, for that matter. Okay, so this hadn't been the worst smack-down Eeth could have dished out, but it had still fucking hurt, and she would be feeling it for a few hours. After adjusting her trousers, the padawan gave one last blow of her nose and went to the refresher to wash her face. This had to be the worst start to any day, ever! Then again, starting this bad meant that it could only improve, right?

* * *

Less than an hour later, they were leaving the Temple on foot through one of its many gates and emerged onto a large square that held a shuttle station and a taxi stand.

"We will take a public shuttle," Eeth told Raven. "It is cheap, and there is an express service from here to the main spaceport." He towed Raven through crowds of people towards a shuttle stop at the far end of the square where a shuttle to the spaceport was just about to leave. Eeth tossed the driver ten credits and pulled Raven in, fighting his way through trunks, bags and suitcases to a free double seat while the shuttle was taking off and accelerating. The spaceport was located on a platform in the upper layer of the atmosphere, well above the planet's topmost level, so the first part of the trip was mainly upwards; they were pressed back into their seats.

"I love flying! Did I ever mention that?" Raven asked rhetorically, unable to keep the smile from her face; the take-off was the best part! Their shuttle ride did not take long, and soon the dome of the spaceport came into view through the side passenger windows. Again, Raven stuck close to Eeth as they made their way to the platform from which they purchased tickets on a star cruiser that would take them to Borleias. They weren't kept waiting long. In fact, there was a ship leaving every other hour. Unfortunately, that didn't mean that this one was any less crowded. Raven looked sideways at Eeth, her nose scrunching as a very large Gran squashed in beside her. Yeah, getting up out of her seat anytime soon was probably not going to happen, which was not welcome news as her ass was yet to fully recover.

"This sucks," the padawan sent across their bond as a large alien woman jammed her backside into their row of seats trying to get past.

"Calm down," Eeth said quietly, only to receive an incredulous 'I am CALM!' look from his padawan. He ignored this. "Once everyone is settled, we will be fine. The trip only lasts two hours. Now may I have your attention?" He pulled out a datapad. "You will need to have at least a minimal grasp of what we are dealing with and why it is important. And it IS important, boring though it may seem." He pressed a button and a spreadsheet flashed up.

Far from mollified, Raven wriggled in her chair in an effort at getting comfortable and looked at the datapad. Yep, he was right about one thing: this was certainly going to be boring.

"Now," said Eeth, "what you see on this spreadsheet is a list of the main bandwidth categories and their uses. For each category, we have a few dozen spreadsheets with individual frequencies. These ones" – he pointed at the topmost category – "are reserved for official and diplomatic purposes. Then there is the military, trade, media, spaceflight and private communication. Consequently, the delegates we will work with include government and business representatives, media companies, spaceflight associations and so forth." He went on to explain the kind of proposals they were going to deal with, showing examples and detailing their implications.

The padawan did her best to pay attention and even asked a few legitimate questions, although after an hour of this it was becoming hard to focus. "Ug, thissucksbanthaballs," the padawan mumbled as Eeth opened up the next section.

Eeth raised his eyebrows and gave her a look that held a hint of a warning. "There is one more detail that you need to pay attention to," he said. "Then we will be done. The trip will soon be over anyway. But this is an important detail. Sometimes, business consortia or media companies are not satisfied with the frequencies they are going to obtain and will try to either get their hands on disused private frequencies or to establish new ones under the alibi identity of private associations, pilots or other individuals. This is sometimes difficult to spot, but the Force can help us recognize attempts at deceiving us and the other delegates. Therefore, we need to check the existence of every association or individual that apply for new frequencies as well as the validity of their claim, and we will need to use our awareness of the Force during the proceedings to detect signs of treachery or of any claim not being what it seems. I will depend on your assistance with that."

"Yes, master, 'course," Raven replied, simply glad that the last point did not involve another twelve pages.

* * *

Less than an hour later, they left the ship and were met by a protocol droid who shuttled them to the conference site and showed them to their quarters, informing them that they had an hour before their meeting with the delegation leaders. This meeting had the purpose of finalising the schedule for their talks.

"Wow," the padawan said when their droid slid the door shut, granting them privacy. Raven dropped her bag. She wasn't sure what she had expected to find, exactly, but the high ceilings, huge frameless windows and view to both the forest and beach were certainly welcome. The cooler, too, was sleek and modern and, much to her delight was stocked full of all kinds of food and drinks suitable for human and Zabrak alike. She pulled out two cans of still water and turned to Eeth. "Impressive, yes?"

"I suppose it is," Eeth said with a look of slight distaste on his face. He was used to such accommodation, of course, but he tended to despise luxury. Picking up his bag, he pointed to one of the adjacent doors. "I will take this room, and you may have the other one. We will unpack our things now and meet back here in half an hour." This would give Raven the beach view; Eeth thought she might enjoy it.

"Awesome! Master, you have to check this out!" Raven yelled upon spotted the beach view her room offered. Tossing the bag onto her bed, she slid open a large double window and took a deep breath. The air was warm and smelled salty and fresh to the Temple-raised padawan. She glanced down, noticed a small ledge jutting out from beneath the window and swung her legs out, feet resting on the platform and breeze blowing in her hair. Lakhri was right, this place was amazing!

"I will when I have unpacked!" Eeth called back. His own window opened towards the rainforest-covered hill range that ran along the beach, which was nearly as spectacular a sight. He took it in for a minute and then stowed his things away quickly and efficiently. Returning to the common room, he picked up a mandaca fruit from the large fruit bowl on their dining table and went to join Raven in her room.

"The view is indeed beautiful," he agreed, stepping up behind her. "Quite a bit more pleasant than the sea on Larivan."

"Yeah, well, Larivan was okay I guess but the sea was rough and murky, nothing like this. This almost looks like it's made of glass," Raven said.

She leant into the window frame, the smell of Eeth's mandaca fruit filling the air. Raven would have happily stayed here forever if Eeth would have let them, but unfortunately, they only had half an hour before their meeting with the delegation leaders. After a few minutes spent simply enjoying the view, Raven swung her legs back inside her window and took in her master's appearance. As always, he was immaculately groomed, his long dark hair was sleek and shiny, his boots were polished and the formal Jedi robes he wore were completely wrinkle-free. Raven glanced down at her crumbled travel clothing and dishevelled hair with a sigh: she had not even unpacked properly.

Eeth looked her up and down. "Better clean yourself up and get changed," he said. "We will meet the delegation leaders soon."

Thankfully, Raven had at least pulled out her Jedi robes so it was easy enough to change quickly, and she was deftly refashioning her braid as Eeth ushered her out the door. The walk from their quarters was over far too quickly for the padawan, and before long they were standing before the group of delegation leaders.

Eeth greeted them politely and introduced himself and his padawan to them, after which they introduced themselves to him and his padawan. Said padawan did manage to maintain an outwardly polite impression, but he had a feeling that she was not paying a lot of attention. Well, he was going to find out soon; it was his habit to quiz his padawans after such sessions in order to make sure they knew who was who.

Most of the delegates were standard fare. Eeth was intrigued, however, by the representative of the Trade Federation, a guild that was emerging as a major player in the galaxy's business community. The delegate was a Neimoidian called Bane Turgun, and Eeth was sure that he would use every legal and illegal means in his power to obtain as many frequencies for the Trade Federation as possible. Fortunately, Eeth had some experience in dealing with Neimoidians and knew how to achieve compliance from them.

After the introductions, the group sat down at a conference table in order to discuss the schedule. As expected, everybody was keen to get this over with as quickly as possible. However, the task list was larger than that of previous conferences, for which reason they agreed that it would be too risky to limit themselves to three days of meetings. After some discussion, they agreed to adjourn the conference by lunchtime on the fourth day and to end the sessions early on the second day to make room for a conference banquet. When that was settled, they all rose, said their goodbyes and left. It was well past lunchtime by this point and Eeth was hungry.

"We may have lunch in our quarters or in the dining hall," Eeth told Raven. "Alternatively, we could order a picnic and take it to the rainforest or to the beach. What would you prefer?"

"For real?" Raven asked rhetorically. "Because a picnic at the beach sounds like fun! Let's do it." She had a slight spring in her step now as they headed for their quarters.

"Of course 'for real'," said Eeth, a slight note of amusement in his voice. "I rarely say things that I do not mean." He ordered two lunchboxes on their terminal and then sent Raven to pack her swimsuit, a towel and a bottle of sunblock.

Once the lunchboxes had arrived, they made their way to the beach where Eeth chose a rocky ledge above the waves as their picnic spot. It was shaded by a few little trees and thus offered protection from the relentless sun. Eeth was not particularly susceptible to sunburns, but he knew that his fair-skinned padawan was.

He spread a blanket and they unpacked their boxes which turned out to contain fruit, cheese, bread, vegetable sticks, dumplings and sauces, plus several bottles of water and tropical fruit cocktails. "Serve yourself," Eeth said, stretching out on the blanket, raising himself on his elbow and choosing a dumpling.

When they had eaten for a while, he asked conversationally: "So, do you remember which of the delegates represents the Trade Federation and what his name is?"

Okay, so typically any breaks in their stillness were instigated by Raven, as it was her who filled most silences. That it was Eeth this time was a surprise. The reason for it, however… "Aww, a pop quiz? C'mon, master, don't be like that. Let's just enjoy the beach. Some time to relax won't kill you, you know," the padawan said in a hopeful tone as she stretched out long on her towel.

"We might or might not get to that," said Eeth dryly, "depending on whether you made an effort to remember the delegates' names. Failing to do so is one of the most common ways in which to offend people, and I would rather avoid that. So? Do you remember the representative of the Trade Federation or not?"

Raven rolled onto her tummy, propping her chin on her palm and taking a grape. Apparently, time out to relax and forget about their mission for a while was not going to happen right now. "Well, I wasn't really concentrating on their names. I was trying to sense their motives and the like through the Force. He's the Neimoidian guy, and if I had to choose a delegate most likely to be up to no good, it would be him. I sensed greed and deception in his Force presence."

"So did I," Eeth said. "And it is a useful thing to pick up although in the case of the Neimoidians, you would be hard-pressed not to sense greed and deception in their Force presence even under the best of circumstances. In any case, you will be expected to know the names and functions of the delegation leaders. Do you remember any of those or will I have to hand you the list for you to memorise?"

"I remember a couple…" Raven sighed. "So you'll probably have to give me the list if I must commit them all to memory. Why I have to in the first place is crazy. It's not like any of them are going to care if I'm there or not." It was true, too, none of the delegate leaders had paid her much mind after the introductions were made.

"They will notice you very soon when fail to greet them with their proper title and name, I can promise you that," said Eeth sternly. He took a datapad from his discarded cloak, loaded the list of participants and narrowed it down to the delegation leaders. Handing her the datapad, he asked, "Have they taught you memorisation techniques in the creche?"

"Yes," came the resigned sigh, and with that Raven got to work.

"Who names their human child 'Moffen Crixous-Wilhuff' anyway? What the Force is wrong with these people?" Raven complained after a few minutes.

"Aristocrats from Tassidra, that is who," Eeth replied. "Not everybody can be graced with the simplicity of a name like mine." The edges of his mouth curled slightly upwards while he said that, and his eyes crinkled in amusement. He was quite enjoying himself, not that he would ever admit that!

"Eeth is a strong name for a Zabrak, it means that you are fearless," said Raven, not sure if she should feel embarrassed for having researched his species or proud to be able to state as much.

Eeth raised his eyebrows, surprised and a little touched that his padawan had gone to the trouble of finding this out. "True," he replied after a pause. "But I doubt that my parents knew this. It's a common name for Zabrak males."

Raven knew this also. Nevertheless, in Eeth's case, she happened to believe the name was befitting of the man. "Alright. I think I got this," she said a short while later, pushing the datapad of names aside.

"Then tell me the name of the representative of the holochannel conglomerate," Eeth said without further ado.

"Umm," Raven flopped onto her back and gazed up at the sky. "Caldman!" she replied after a moment and looked pretty pleased with herself when Eeth nodded. Raven was able to answer all except for one positively ridiculous alien name that in her opinion ought to be replaced with X.

Eeth made her practice the allegedly unmemorable name about twenty times and then went through the list a second time, providing her with the species and looks of all the delegates. When they were done, the sun was well beyond its highest point. Eeth insisted that Raven use sunblock thoroughly, on all parts of her body, before he finally allowed her to enter the water.

Raven ran to the edge of the rocky ledge, about to fling herself over, when she thought better of it and skidded to a halt. It was not a HUGE drop, but it was certainly more than Eeth would allow if he wasn't around. Thus, she looked back at Eeth who was making his way towards her in his typical unhurried fashion, the question clear in her expression yet remaining unasked.

Eeth nodded for her to go ahead, following at a more leisurely pace.

At the first sign of permission Raven leapt from the edge, executing an ungraceful bomb into the water below. The moment she surfaced, however, a wave rolled in, forcing her to duck under it. The water was cool, unbelievably clear and teaming with creatures of all sorts. Raven popped her head above water and shielded her eyes from the sun to look upwards towards the ledge, hoping to catch Eeth's entry, and then almost jumped out of her skin when he popped up beside her. "Force! Master! I thought you were a sea monster or something," she exclaimed, suddenly feeling the need to check behind her; there was nothing there… Of course she knew there was no way in Hoth that her master would allow them to swim in here if there were actually sea monsters, but she couldn't help it: some of the creatures they'd taught her about in crèche were truly horrifying.

Eeth gave her a small smile, guessing her thoughts. "There are no dangerous aquatic creatures on Borleias," he said. "You will be safe. They have large sea mammals but those usually keep well away from the shore, and even if they approach it for some reason, they are harmless plant eaters. Let us swim for a bit. Shall I race you to the rocks?" He pointed to a small outcrop, about a hundred metres from the cliff. Since the next three and a half days of conference sessions were going to be rather stressful for his restless padawan, he intended to make as much use of this afternoon as he could to give her a thorough workout.

"A race? Ok, but I get a headstart, right?" she asked, inching towards the rocks a little. They had raced once or twice on the mission to Fenesteer, and she knew that to give him any challenge at all, he would need to give her a decent advantage.

"I will," Eeth agreed. "Twenty strokes. Ready?"

"Ready!"

They raced each other for the better part of the next hour; Eeth feeling that Raven would desperately need the exercise if they were to survive the coming days without major incidents. He might try to make time for swimming in the mornings or evenings, but those would be brief occasions.

By the time they made it ashore and collected their gear, Raven was utterly exhausted. She wasn't aware that Eeth was, to a degree, taking precautionary measures to keep her skittish nature from getting her into trouble. Force, not that she would have held it against him or even argued the point, for that matter; she struggled with patience at the best of times and knew it.

"I could have taken you out on that last one," she boasted, her voice muffled from towelling off her hair at the same time. "But I decided to let you win. I mean, I didn't want to mess up your winning streak or anything."

Eeth smiled in amusement as he brushed his long hair back but did not reply.

At that moment a small solid ball whizzed towards Raven's head. Two things happened within the same instant. Firstly Raven dodged, and secondly, Eeth's hand shot out, catching the ball before it could wipe her out.

"Nasty! That's gotta hurt!" they heard someone say from the ballgame.

"Man, ow," another voice added.

The snap the ball had made when it cracked into Eeth's palm continued to draw hisses and whistles of sympathy from the players, and even Raven had to cringe. The Force had warned her of a threat, but given that sensing inanimate objects was difficult for the girl, she was surprised to discover that her instincts had kicked in.

"That was a good dodge, padawan," Eeth said, suppressing the flash of pain he had sensed when the hard ball had hit his palm. "Your instincts have much improved."

"Thank you, master." And it really had meant a lot to Raven as Eeth did not praise her for just anything.

Still blushing, she looked up at him. "I think they're playing vossball." For a moment the padawan contemplated asking if she could join them, but then she remembered that Eeth had said all of her free time would be spent doing maths and decided not to push her luck. He had let them go on a picnic, after all.

"Is that what you would like to do in the two to three hours we have left until dinner?" Eeth asked Raven.

Raven blinked, confusion evident in her expression. "I get a choice? Really? I thought you were chaining me to a desk for the rest of my life. Well, until I pass remedial maths, in any case." That might as well be the rest of her life, as far as she was concerned!

"After our return, I will be sure to do exactly that," said Eeth half-sternly. "This is a mission, though, and I do not want to distract you from what is important, especially not during term break. The more exercise you get now, the better you will be able to sit still and avoid embarrassing us tomorrow." Which did indeed take precedence over Raven's lessons for now, as far as Eeth was concerned.

Okay, that had been unexpected, far from unwelcome, but unexpected all the same. Unwilling to look a gift bantha in the mouth, Raven seized the opportunity. "Can I play with them? Please?"

Eeth scanned the group of youngsters who were about Raven's age and obviously a little wary to ask to have their ball back.

"Go and join them, padawan," he said, handing her the ball. "You have got two hours."

"Thank you, master!" Raven might have asked him to join them, yet she had known Eeth long enough now to realise that this would be a selfish request as he would only be doing it for her. Well, Eeth had already been more than generous today, so she offered him a slight bow in gratitude and took off for the game, ball in hand.

It did not take her long to find a spot in the game, nor did it take the others long to realise their new midfielder had particularly fast reflexes.

"Hey, nice moves," an abnormally tall, red-haired teen commented, stepping up from outfield to stand by Raven. "But if we want to win this, we'll need to move in; this next guy couldn't hit a bantha's ass with a banjo. Trust me."

"Thanks for the tip," said Raven, smiling up, AND UP at the girl. She had to be at least 190cm tall and was extremely thin. Her clothing was tasteful yet more provocative than anything the Temple-raised padawan owned. Still, Raven did not stare even though she wasn't sure of her species.

The game was fun, and by the time the final batter stepped up to the mark, Raven had made friends with a handful of kids, most of whom were here on vacation or were family members belonging to those in the conference.

"You should come out with us tonight! We are having a bonfire on the main beach and maybe doing some late-night exploring," the extraordinarily tall and thin girl, whom Raven now knew as Bree, encouraged.

"I should, correct! Whether or not I'm allowed remains to be seen," replied Raven, nodding towards the approaching figure of Eeth.

The small crowd of kids turned to greet the man, but it was Amon, a stoutly-built, tan-skinned human boy who spoke up. "Hey, mister, I gotta say, that was some catch before! You're gonna play on our team next time, right?"

Eeth raised his eyebrows at the unexpected request. He had, so far, enjoyed a rare afternoon of leisure. Even he could not quite see what there was left to prepare for the conference, so he had fetched their things from the clifftop, brought them to the beach and had basked in the sun for a while – something that he, being from a desert race, sometimes missed on Coruscant. He had then gone for another swim, this time long and fast enough to come somewhere close to the limits of his considerable endurance. Pleasantly exhausted, he had returned to the beach, making sure his padawan was still with the other youngsters, and knelt down for some meditation. When he had sensed that the game was drawing to a close, he glanced at his chrono and realised that they would have to return to the hotel if they wanted to take a shower before dinner.

"Thank you for the offer," he replied politely to Amon's request. "If we have the time, I might take you up on it. Unfortunately, my apprentice and I are part of the hyperspace communication frequencies conference that will start tomorrow and has a rather tight schedule. We might not have a lot of time to spare in the next three to four days, I am afraid."

"Apprentice?" Bree butted in before Amon could get a word out. Then, for the first time, the tall, red-headed girl took a good look at the newcomers. She was certain Eeth was not Raven's father; was that even genetically possible? And even if it were, they were entirely different colours! It would have to be some mother. It wasn't until Bree spotted their lightsabers that realisation finally dawned. "You two must be the Jedi moderators, then. That explains some things," Bree announced, referring to Ravens quick reflexes.

"C'mon Bree, sheez, did you just figure that out?" Amon teased.

"Hey, unlike some, I kept my eye on the game!"

"Are you insinuating that my mad powers of observation somehow detracted from my game?" Amon shot back, and Bree just rolled her eyes.

Raven watched the exchange with a slight smirk on her face. When there was a big enough break in their banter, she introduced Eeth to her new friends. They spoke for a few minutes more; Amon was pleased that the Zabrak man with equally mad reflexes might actually play on their team.

Eeth and Raven bid them a kind farewell, taking their leave as the two continued arguing over why Amon had to use the word 'mad' in every sentence. "They are holding some bonfire thing on the beach tonight," Raven hedged as they found their way on to the footpath that would lead them back to the hotel.

Eeth's first impulse was to say 'no,' but he paused to consider his answer. There was no real reason why Raven should not be allowed to go; the other youngsters had left a good impression on him, and Raven had little enough time to interact with non-Jedi other than on official mission business. Besides, she had a few very demanding days coming up, and a bit of, well, 'fun' might help her get through them.

"Alright," he finally said. "As long as I know where you are and you come back at a reasonable time. I want you to be well-rested tomorrow."

Raven inhaled, ready to sigh over not getting permission when his actual words registered; he had actually said yes! Truth be told, she had not expected that outcome, not that she was about to complain about it!

"You really mean it, I can go?" the Padawan asked rhetorically, her expression becoming animated as it sunk in. "I can be back by eleven. The bonfire is being held at the beachfront so it will be easy to see, and I'll take my comlink. Thank you so much for letting me, master. I've had the best day ever!" Raven said, and then, despite the fact that they were both still walking, she sprang up and hugged him; she wanted Eeth to know how much this meant to her and how much she appreciated it.

"Yes, yes, you are welcome," Eeth said a little stiffly, trying to bear the public hug with as much dignity as possible without actually shaking her off. "And I want you to be back by ten thirty. You need your sleep. Tomorrow will be a very long day, and I think you will find that all the sun and activity will make you quite tired."

Raven, of course, noticed his discomfort and with a full smile still on her face, she released her hold on him. After all, the gesture wasn't designed to make him feel bad. "Ten thirty, you got it, I promise!" the padawan said, practically bouncing as they walked. A bonfire party with regular kids around her age! Raven hadn't ever been to anything like this before. Force, today had been a first for a few things and the padawan was on a serious high right now.

And precisely for that fact, Eeth just hoped he was not going to regret his decision…


	3. Chapter 3

Raven still had a smile on her face as they entered their quarters after what had been a long and full first day on Borleias. They'd had a picnic lunch on the beach, swam, she had played vossball and now there was just enough time to eat a quick dinner before she needed to leave for the bonfire. While they waited for the food they had ordered, Raven went to change. She emerged from her rather luxurious bedroom dressed in a bikini, some shorts and an open shirt that would double as a cardigan when the evening air got a bit cooler. "Bree said the bonfire will start around seven, but won't really get going until eight or so. Is this okay?" Raven asked, gesturing to her clothing as she slid into the chair opposite Eeth. It was unlikely that he expected her to attend a teens' beach party clad in her robes, but she thought it best to ask in any case.

"Yes, this is perfectly fine," said Eeth mildly. "I would not expect you to wear a uniform to a beach event."

Raven served herself to some soup and toast. Then, she undid her padawans' braid, not minding that it left the section crimped; that section of hair was permanently crimped after she had worn a braid for over a year now. It was a novelty to blend with non-Jedi peers so the padawan wanted to look like she fit in. And she did look like everyone else now, although her clothing was far from designer labels. Oh, well, at least she had had the good sense to bring a nice swimsuit.

When she had eaten the soup and cleaned up her dishes, Raven was ready to go. "So, what are you going to do while I'm out having fun?" Raven asked while sitting on the floor to pull on her shoes.

"I brought some work," Eeth said, giving her a brief smile. "I might watch the news channel later. Nothing exciting. Take your comlink wherever you go and be back by ten thirty. Enjoy yourself, padawan."

"Gee, don't go too crazy there," Raven teased him, and after offering a curt bow, she clipped her commlink to her shorts and left.

The party was not hard to find as the bonfire was a good six or so meters high and growing fast when Raven rounded the final bend. Kicking off her shoes, she stepped onto the sand and was surprised to discover two separate gatherings: one large and one conspicuously smaller group congregated on either side of the fire. Her senses stretched out to scan the area for any fluctuations or abnormalities in the Force, but she could find nothing other than some mild tension and a lot of 'altered' minds, neither of which counted as abnormal at a teens' beach party.

"Raven! Over here," Bree called, jumping up from her spot and waving the girl over. Amon and Bree had arrived early in order to secure a good spot by the fire.

"This is supposed to be a tropical planet! I can't believe it gets so freakin' cold at night!" Amon complained, earning himself an eye roll from both girls as they sat down on the log.

"Well, I still can't believe you didn't bring a shirt. Honestly, don't you have parents?" Bree shot back in a tone that implied she was sick of having that particular conversation.

"Here, why don't you sit in the middle," Raven suggested, standing up from her spot and sandwiching him between herself and Bree. Amon slouched and sighed contentedly at the attention, drawing a snort from Bree who wasted no time in accusing him of purposefully coming sans shirt in order to snuggle with girls. Their bickering continued for a while, switching topics several times before Raven had a chance to get a word in. "Hey, why are there two groups, why aren't they sitting with the rest of us?" she questioned, gesturing to the opposite side of the fire where a dozen or so smartly dressed teens were talking amongst themselves.

"Because they think they're too good to sit with the likes of us," said Amon.

"They're from the 'Upper West Wing.' You know?" Bree added, raising both brows at receiving Raven's confused expression. "The West Wing is reserved for the most wealthy, prestigious guests."

"I heard that even their outdoor shower and toilet facilities are gold-plated," Amon added.

"They are," confirmed Bree, her expression one of distaste. Her grandmother and family resided in the West Wing, yet Bree did not like the stigma. In fact, she found all the lavish luxuries embarrassing.

"What a waste of resources," the padawan said upon noticing Bree's discomfort, wanting to put her at ease.

"I'd love to get back at them for the prank they pulled on us. Problem is that security in the West Wing is super tight. They have free reign to mess with us, but we can't get them back unless one of us learns how to fly," Amon concluded.

"Wait… Amon, you just gave me an idea," Bree said, looking at Raven briefly before pulling them in to explain.

* * *

"No way," Raven said decisively. "Eeth won't approve." Besides, Raven was still getting over the last revenge-style prank she pulled and no stuck-up royal was worth the ass-kicking she had gotten for it.

"Eeth will never know. With your mad Jedi skill, Bree's royal lineage and my awesome planning it's foolproof. You can't possibly get busted," Amon assured her. Bree's idea to get Raven to help them was solid, and possibly their only hope at getting their own back.

"As much as I hate to admit this, he's right. Besides, we owe them one," Bree griped.

"I'm always right," countered Amon, and then turned back to Raven. "Bree has access to the West Wing. She can get through security and say she's visiting the library. Once inside, she can use the bathrooms, opening the side window while she is in there."

"Wait a moment," Raven said, holding up a hand to silence him and turning to Bree. "If you have access why don't you just do it yourself, and then nobody would need to make the climb."

Bree shrugged. "I would, but I'll be on camera going in, and there are security posts inside. If I disappear into the bathroom area for an extended period of time and then, woopsie, the next thing everyone is covered in dye, they might just be smart enough to work out that it was me."

Raven frowned, thinking it was worth the risk…

Amon, however, thought the notion was crazy and continued. "I can mess up their cameras from my datapad and work distraction while you climb up the wall, enter through the window and carry out the deed. Nobody will ever suspect it was us as there is nobody on this beach other than you that could possibly make that climb. And the only person that would be seen by security entering will be Bree, and she will not have spent long enough in the bathroom area for it to be plausible that she planted the dye. She will be on record as entering, visiting the bathroom and returning to the library; it's the perfect alibi," Amon concluded.

That there was nobody else who could pull this off was yet another issue that Raven had with this plan! She was about to tell them no way when a group of older teens sitting on the adjacent log leant across and offered their support. "We'll back you. Distractions are our speciality. It would be satisfying to see them get some of their own back for a change. And, poindexter here is right: no cameras, no proof!" the taller boy concluded.

"Plus, it's not like they don't deserve it. We owe them one! They put purple stain in all our foot buckets, and it was permanent! It took two days to get it off," a younger blonde girl commented, bristling with indignation.

Raven didn't care. The consequences of spiking Nereem's soup with laxatives during their return trip from Larivan had been suitably dire to ensure that the padawan never indulged in acts of petty revenge again. And her staunch expression said as much.

"I guess one of us could risk climbing up instead," the blonde girl continued, switching tactics. "But… it's a loooong way down if one of us should happen to fall," she said dramatically, turning to point out the row of fancy-looking showers on the outside wall.

Raven was entirely unmoved by the attempt at coercion. "I think this is a bad idea for more reasons than the danger involved. Speaking of danger, though… Eeth would," she paused, realising that she was about to make herself extremely unpopular. "Eeth would expect me to tell him what you're planning, so he could intervene and prevent anyone from falling and getting hurt," she finally admitted, earning looks of utter disgust from the others.

"I knew I shouldn't have trusted a Jedi. Fine, be a goody-two-shoes, then," said Bree, turning her back on the padawan in contempt.

Raven ignored the temper tantrum for the time being, hoping that Bree would understand and eventually come around.

Yeah… It took a solid hour spent enduring nasty glares, jibes from the others and failed efforts to come up with a plan sans dangerous second story window climb before the padawan finally caved. "Argh! Fine! I'll do it. I'll do it! Just shut up about it already. If covering a bunch of wealthy farts in pink dye means that much to you. Force!" Raven exclaimed. She knew this was wrong, really, she did, but for the sake of fitting in for just one night was it really such a big deal? Her thoughts didn't have time to mature, though, as the group's hushed whoops of delight had her attention once again. No one had been particularly keen on scaling two stories to reach the side window or being ratted out for trying, after all.

Twenty-five minutes later, Raven found herself clad in a massively oversized beige jumper and her bikini pants, springing from ledge to ledge with a small bag of 'pansy passion pink' dye pellets tied to her saber belt. She had taken one of the boys' jumpers as it matched the colour of the backing wall behind the showers, and ditched her white shorts in favour of bare legs, not that her legs were much darker.

True to their word, the group of older teens had indeed provided a distraction and set off several speciality fireworks that exploded into brightly coloured, crude shapes of various species' anatomy. The noise was deafening and would have drawn the attention of everyone within a half-kilometre radius, leaving Raven free to jump through the side window and out onto the balcony. Working quickly, the padawan silently unfastened each showerhead and inserted a pink dye pip before refastening them and climbing back out the window. Unfortunately, she jammed her hand in the window trying to pull it shut and fell to the first ledge, scraping her knee on the jagged bricks before managing to slow her descent using the Force.

Fuck! Yep, that had really hurt, but it wasn't what had her worried. Firstly, this was right where the overflow trickled down the wall, which was covered in moss and Force only knew what else. Secondly, hiding this from Eeth? Yeah.

Five minutes later, Raven's feet hit the ground. Her knee was gushing blood but it wasn't a stitches job or anything like that. She walked back to join Amon who was grinning maniacally over what he called a datapad but what looked more like a satellite launcher.

"Done, done and DONE!" he said, obviously pleased with himself for fooling the camera system. Raven was about to ask how he had done it when Bree waltzed up behind them carrying two data chips on…

"The Geriatric Care of Hutts!?" Amon exclaimed, shooting her an incredulous expression.

"What? I didn't have time to be choosy!" Bree defended and tilted her head sideways at spotting what remained of the older teens' distraction as it slowly melted from the sky.

"Umm, is that supposed to be what I think it is?" Raven commented but was interrupted by her alarm. She would have to be back in half an hour. "I suppose I should try and clean myself up," she said, seating herself on the log to change and assess the damage to her knee.

Bree pulled some tissues from her pocket, handing them to Raven in an effort at helping. She wasn't squeamish, yet nor did she know the first thing about first aid.

"Ouch, kid, that looks nasty. Are you okay?" the boy who had loaned Raven his jumper asked upon noticing the blood.

"It looks worse than it actually is," Raven observed as she picked brickwork and grouting from the wound. "Do me a favour and get me some seawater?"

He was about to ask what he was meant to collect said seawater in when Raven upended her cup of soda, handing it to him.

"Well, looks like your little firecracker display was too much for the prat pack!" said Amon, happy for the distraction as he really wasn't good with blood. "Now, courtesy of our local cat-burglar, royal, brain and brawn, it's time to sit back and enjoy the show." And sure enough, the group of smartly dressed teens left the beach muttering words of disgust at such an inappropriate display of smut in a public area.

Ten minutes later, loud bellows and curse words could be heard from the West Wing balcony showers, and the group of teens watching were literally rolling on the sand laughing. Their plan had been a roaring success! Not that Raven cared; she was more worried about the potential repercussions should Eeth find out.

At precisely ten thirty on the dot, Raven entered their quarters, looking exhausted. A long beach towel conveniently covered her sandy, bikini-clad body from neck to shin, and she carried a bundle of damp clothing in her arms. "Master," she greeted him, inclining her head slightly. "I'm cold, I'm gonna have a shower and wash the sand off me," she said, teeth chattering. It wasn't terribly cold, but Raven had practically no body fat on her and often felt the elements more than others.

"Padawan," Eeth greeted her. He looked up from where he was sitting on the couch, frowning slightly. "Are you not feeling well?" he asked in concern. The climate on Borleias was tropical and while it did cool down a little at night, he still felt that it was fairly warm and his padawan's teeth ought not to be chattering.

"I'm fine. We were sitting around talking all night, and you know how much I hate sitting still. Anyway, I'm not used to all the sunshine," Raven assured him while heading for her bedroom. The latter was true, Coruscant wasn't exactly the sunniest of locations, and even though the Temple was located on the topmost level of Coruscant, it was still smoggy. The part about sitting around, however, couldn't be further from the truth. On rare occasions, if Eeth wasn't suspicious, she could get away with a bit of not-too-outrageous untruth; she hoped that this was going to be one of those times.

Eeth had the very slight feeling that there was something off but he assumed he was reading too much into the fact that Raven seemed a little unwell. After all, it had been a long day for her, she was probably tired and it was true that she was not used to the sunshine. "Come back here in ten minutes for our evening meditation!" he called after her.

Raven used that time to hose the sand off her. However, when she went for the small tube of bacta that she had taken from the cruise ship on their mission to Larivan, it wasn't there.

Fuck! Raven had lugged that tube around in her personal kit for months now, yet had taken it out when she had last cleaned it out and apparently forgotten to repack it.

Okay, so this wasn't going as planned. Improvise! Raven threw what medical supplies she had access to on the floor of her private refresher and got to work. When she was done, the wound was clean and free from contaminants – well, as best she could manage without a full medkit at her disposal. Wrapping it in a bandage, the padawan pulled a pair of cotton training pants from her pack and pulled them on. It worked to hide her knee, which was going to have to do for now. When she exited exactly ten minutes later, her face was flushed.

"You seem to be a little sunburnt," said Eeth. "I will give you a lotion that you should apply to your skin before going to bed."

And once again, fortunately for Raven, he put the very slight sense of wrongness he had during their meditation down to the combination of fatigue and the prolonged exposure to Borleias' hot sun. Besides, he was unusually tired himself and he was therefore not in a particularly vigilant mood.

That evening, when Eeth sent her to bed, Raven went directly to her private refresher and again checked on her handiwork. The wound itself wasn't that bad. It was just the nature of it that had her concerned. Even the cleanest toilet and showers tended to be rife with bacteria. She flushed it again quickly and was in bed when Eeth came to tuck her in.

* * *

Well before she was ready to face the day, Raven found herself squinting drowsily from behind splayed fingers at the man standing in her doorway. Her lip curled into a smile that was concealed by her bedsheet. "Argh, go away… shoo!" That line had worked for Lakhri, so maybe it would work for her also?

"Padawan, the conference is going to start in one hour," Eeth said firmly. "I will not keep everyone waiting just because you feel loath to get up."

He folded her bedspread back and motioned for her to stand up. "Get going," he said. "Now."

"I'm going already," Raven said through a yawn and dragged herself to the refresher. As usual, a shower helped to bring her into the land of the living, not that she was keen on their schedule.

"I'm tired," she said in way of greeting as she entered the dining room, slumping into the chair. Her hair was still slightly damp and had yet to be brushed, but she was otherwise dressed and ready to go.

"And a very good morning to you, too," Eeth replied pointedly. "Would you like a pancake? They are stuffed with fruit and are quite good."

He offered her a plate with a selection of lavishly decorated, very thin pancakes wrapped around intricately sliced tropical fruit in all colours of the rainbow.

"Pancakes? Neat," Raven replied, sounding more chipper, and helped herself to one. She thought they did indeed look good.

"What time do we have to be there?" she asked between bites. They had discussed the schedule but perhaps, by some great stroke of luck, the start was held up. It could happen.

"At nine," Eeth replied. "Which means we have to leave in half an hour. Do you remember what your job will be during the talks?"

"My job?" It was as much a statement as it was a question. Raven looked puzzled for a moment. However, when Eeth frowned at her, she sat up a bit straighter. "Um, well, you want me to listen and not cause any trouble… Oh, my job! _That _JOB! I have to help you scan for delegates who might be deceiving us or others in order to obtain more frequencies." Raven was pleased that she hadn't needed reminding of that part. Eesh. She felt a bit off today but put that down to the clusterfuck that she had allowed the others to coerce her into last night. So far, Eeth had not suspected anything; then again, he had no reason to suspect anything.

Yeah…

* * *

The auditorium was large and elegantly furnished with different genres of artwork and strangely shaped pottery pieces that filled purposely-built nooks and shelves. Raven paused in front of a particularly odd-looking sculpture that was not dissimilar in appearance to some of the fireworks' shapes from the previous evening's distraction. She tilted her head to the side in an effort to figure out exactly what it was supposed to be – not that she had long to ponder this as seconds later Eeth made his way towards the chief delegates' table and offered her the choice to either sit by him or join the others in the auditorium. She chose the auditorium for a few reasons, the first and most important being that spreading themselves out would increase their chances of picking up random information. Before she could leave Eeth's side to take up a seat, however, they were approached by the representative of the holochannel conglomerate himself, a Farghul prince who was among the wealthiest people in the galaxy. Peculiarly, his fur was looking decidedly too pink for a Farghul. Raven stared at him for a split-second too long before catching herself.

"Yes, yes," said Kyle upon noticing the padawan's look. "Please ignore my peculiar appearance," he excused himself with a wave of his hand. "Someone thought it amusing to prank the West Wing communal showers. I can't imagine it was one of ours, but then, anyone else would have needed to climb two stories up the far wall. But I did not come here to talk of fur colours," he said and started speaking to Eeth about a particular point that was to be brought up in this afternoon's agenda, and his last-minute proposal.

Eeth raised his eyebrows. He knew for a fact that at least one of the kids at the beach party COULD "make the climb up the far wall." That, coupled with the distinct sense of guilt emanating from Raven and the fact that her gaze was lingering just a bit too long on Kyle's fur, induced him to throw her a suspicious look and send a mental inquiry her way through their bond. Outwardly, of course, he calmly and politely discussed the delegate's last-minute proposal.

Raven returned his mental inquiry and look with what she hoped was neutrality, and when it was polite to do so, she left them to continue their conversation and made for the safety of her auditorium chair.

Eeth did not buy her attempt at appearing unconcerned for a moment. However, getting to the bottom of this would have to wait since the conference was about to begin.

As expected, the morning session was long, arduous and completely void of anything even remotely interesting. Even if Raven had not felt on edge over Kyle's appearance, the pain in her knee was beginning to bother her and it was becoming difficult to remain focussed. Yeah, the former was a worry. She prodded at it with her fingers, feeling both heat and swelling, neither of which boded well. It meant that, despite her best efforts, the wound was probably infected.

In a way, Eeth was glad that his padawan's attention lasted longer than the first coffee break. However, the level of distractedness she was displaying towards the end of the morning session was unacceptable, much as it was to be expected. He really needed to talk to her for this reason and some others but he did not have the slightest chance to do so during the morning coffee break or lunch break because he was beleaguered by delegates who were asking for adjustments in the schedule. Much to his relief, when the afternoon coffee break came around, everybody seemed to grow tired of the proceedings. Before anyone could make it to the podium where he had been sitting throughout the session, he managed to beckon for Raven and usher her out of the room.

"Come, padawan," he said, leading her to a side door that led to the gardens at the back of the hotel. Those offered more opportunities for privacy than the beach.

Raven followed. By now she was limping slightly thanks to the pain in her knee. Much to her increasing displeasure, the wound had gotten progressively worse as the session wore on. "That was horrific," she commented as Eeth found them a secluded bench between some bushes.

"It was, but I have more pressing matters to discuss with you," said Eeth. "Padawan, is there something wrong with your leg?"

By this stage, Raven saw no point in trying to hide it from him. In fact, had he not been tied up in discussions with delegates, she might have told him when it started to become bothersome. Scooting back on the bench, she rolled up her pant leg to reveal the bandage that was now showing signs of yellowing from beneath. "Yeah. I scraped it on some jagged brickwork last night. It wasn't that bad, so I decided to patch it up myself but I think it's become infected." Just as she said the latter, she peeled the bandage back to see. Yep, it was gross.

Eeth frowned.

"Alright, we are going back to our quarters to treat this," he said. "Now, and fast. We only have half an hour's break." He fastened the bandage provisionally and pulled Raven up from the bench.

"Come," he said. "And while we walk, tell me how you scraped it and whether this is in any way related to what happened to the showers in the West Wing."

Raven's brows rose high. Now how the Force had he made that connection? Really, how? And then it dawned on her. He had noticed her surprise and discomfort when Caldman had spoken about it earlier and probably made the connection. Yeah, that was one of the downsides to having established a training bond; very little slipped through the cracks. Resigned, Raven dragged her hand down her face.

"It's like I said, I scraped it on some brickwork while leaving the bathroom," she stated, disinclined to answer his second question. However, when Eeth gave her a pointed look, she guiltily dropped her gaze. He did not need to say anything. "Master, c'mon. Please don't look at me like that," she whined, practically cringing under his scrutiny. "The truth is I don't want to tell you because what I did was stupid and…" Raven wrinkled her nose. "You'll be disappointed; you'll punish me." Moreover, the padawan did absolutely not want to tell him she had been coerced into helping out with some stupid prank during their first day, especially after he had been so generous in allowing her to have some fun. Eeth had trusted her, and she felt miserable for trying to get away with this. That said, nor did she particularly want her ass handed to her when she had to sit on it for the next three days.

"Yes, and I will punish you worse if I have to drag it out of you," Eeth snapped. He palmed open the door to their suite and pointed at the couch.

"Sit down and let me look after your knee," he said. "And while I do so, you will tell me precisely what you did, without further stalling, or I will make sure that you will not sit comfortably during the next session."

The look Raven gave him as she sat was truly piteous. It wasn't that she had expected any less from him, but still, her knee throbbed and she was thirsty. Today, she had gone through three bottles of water which was strange, yet probably not so strange considering the climate here.

"Well, it's – like this…" she began as Eeth found their medical kit and joined her on the couch.

It took a few stern words of encouragement from Eeth before the padawan finally managed to convey exactly what had happened from the time she had left the apartment last night until the time she returned. It had not been easy as Raven knew she had not made the right decision and caved in to peer pressure. "Please don't be mad at me. I really didn't want to do it but –" The girl winced as he started swabbing the wound. "They made me feel like I was putting them in danger for not helping them out, and then they made me out to be a traitor for threatening to tell you about their plans. I guess I wanted to be accepted. I wanted to have fun with them in my free time and not be treated like an adult. I know that is not my role as a Jedi, but, uhh. I…" Raven sighed and glanced up to meet his gaze for the first time since he had sat down. "I don't have any excuse for what I did."

Eeth nodded. "You are right, there is no excuse," he said sternly. After a small pause, he continued in a slightly softer tone of voice, "However, I am pleased that you did actually think before rushing to comply with your peers' wishes. You should not have caved in to pressure, but caving in to pressure is definitely much less reprehensible than rushing into a foolish stunt like this without a second thought. Still, this will not be the last time that people will try to exploit your Jedi abilities for their own purposes. You have to learn to deal with this, and we both know that there is really only one acceptable way of dealing with it."

He opened the medical kit and pulled out a syringe.

"Nobody has ever claimed that being a Jedi is easy," he said. "You are making progress, but you still have much to learn. We will talk more about this tonight because there is simply no time right now. Our priority is to get rid of the infection in your knee. Had you come to me right away, I would have given you bacta and provided some Force-aided healing, which would probably have been sufficient. Now an infection has set in. You will need a shot."

"Huh? Wait, it doesn't need anything like that, honest!" she exclaimed, scrambling to her feet and covering her knee with a hand. Raven was no coward – unless it came to taking a shot. Then all her bravado went to hell in a handbasket.

"Padawan, sit back down!" Eeth snapped. "I do not want this infection to spread, and that is why you are going to sit and put your knee back here. Now."

Eeth's tolerance with this kind of fussing was extremely limited, if not non-existent. He considered it inappropriate in a Jedi. Besides, he was impatient to return to the conference. The afternoon session was coming up and he most definitely did not want to arrive late. Had Raven not pulled away, this would not have taken more than two seconds.

Raven, on the other hand, couldn't care less about the infection or getting back to the conference. She didn't want that shot; it was going to hurt. Then again, if the look on Eeth's face was anything to go by, he wasn't giving her a choice; either she sat down, or he was probably going to start swatting and then she would have to sit down anyway. Cowed, and doing her best to mask her fear with stubbornness, the padawan sat. She was purposefully out of his reach, but she had obeyed.

Eeth uncapped the syringe and rested a restraining hand on Raven's knee.

"Look out of the window," he ordered. The sun was low in the sky by now and taking on a violet tinge that coloured the forested mountains in shades of red and blue; it was quite a spectacular sight. Capitalizing on the brief moment of diversion, Eeth quickly dealt out the shot, which was over in less than two seconds.

Raven appreciated his attempt at distraction, truly she did. However, she was Eeth's apprentice and not easily fooled. Still, she obeyed him and looked out the window. A split-second later she let out a squeal, and had Eeth not kept a hold of her leg, she would have been out the window in a heartbeat. As it was, however, she glared daggers at him although, given her flushed cheeks and glassy eyes, it looked more like the cute pout of a swatted youngling than the icy, death-inducing staredown she was hoping for. In hindsight, it had not really hurt that much, yet Raven's fear of the thing had made it all feel as if he'd cut off her leg at the hip!

"Well," Eeth said, unperturbed, "if it hurt this much, the infection was even more serious than I had thought. I'm glad that this has been taken care of."

He dabbed the wound with an analgesic, covered the knee with bacta and wrapped it in a clean bandage.

"I told you it was going to hurt!" Raven complained, rolling the leg of her trousers down and getting to her feet. She was not ready to forgive him just yet, even if it had been for her own good.

Eeth glared at her. "You," he said, "are in enough trouble without compounding it further. We need to get back to the conference. Rest assured that will have a thorough discussion tonight concerning the actions that led to your injury. Now come."

Raven softened slightly at hearing that. With all the commotion, she had not thought about having to discuss with Eeth how this had happened in the first place. It hadn't been the most terrible misdeed, but then, she had given in to her peers' wishes in order to fit in. Was that worth it? The jury was still out on that. Probably not, though, if the look on Eeth's face was anything to go by. So it was that the padawan followed him out of their quarters without further backtalk, which wasn't to say that she was at all happy about having to endure another session. It was going to be boring and her unenthusiastic expression said it all.

"Padawan, I know this is hard," said Eeth, who was not without compassion. "It has been a long day and it is not over yet. But you need to pull yourself together. The longer the conference proceeds, the more likely it will be that anyone tries something deceitful in the hopes that everyone will be too exhausted and distracted to notice. Do you have ideas on how you might be able to enhance your focus?"

Raven sighed. "Not really. I mean, even if they were discussing something fun like speeder-racing it would still be far too long to sit. I am trying."

"There are some mental techniques that can help you to stay focussed," said Eeth. "For example, it might help to mentally go through everything you know about a given delegate's species or home world when he or she speaks. Or to picture them in a different outfit. Or… no, I had better NOT tell you what Lakhri used to imagine."

"Oh, wait. You totally have to tell me now?" Raven begged. Lakhri had come up with some fantastic tricks to make maths homework that bit more bearable when Eeth had last been away, and if he had some secret weapon on enduring diplomacy, then, hell, the girl wanted in!

"Well," Eeth said reluctantly, "it is not much of a stretch of the imagination from picturing them with DIFFERENT clothes. When I found out he was using his data pad to draw them the way he imagined them, I was not altogether impressed, though."

"Different clothes?" The padawan looked truly perplexed for a moment before the credit finally dropped and she started chuckling. "You mean like naked? Force, what if I start laughing?" He would kill her, that was what, she thought.

"I did not say it was my recommended method," Eeth said with dignity, drawing another chuckle from his padawan. "Different clothes will be entirely sufficient. The important thing is to find ways of remaining focussed on what is going on, even if you find yourself unable to follow the minutiae of the discussion. Incidentally," he continued, keen on changing the topic, "have you observed the delegates of the Trade Federation?"

"I have, and I don't like them," Raven answered. "They have …" She paused for a moment, wondering how best to describe what she felt from them. "They have a sinister feel about them through the Force, yet you said that Neimoidians can be like that all the time. What do you think? What did you notice?"

"They do feel rather sinister, even for Neimoidians," Eeth replied slowly. "It is hard to say if this is just their usual nature or if they have any particular intentions. In general, they have extremely strong emotions which we can easily sense through the Force, and they are weak, greedy and deceitful at the best of times. They will use any opportunity to make a profit at someone else's expense. Whether there is anything more than that going on right now remains to be seen. Since they are afraid of the Jedi, I do not really expect them to try anything. But I might be wrong on that account. We should definitely be cautious."

Raven nodded but said nothing else, and as the conference kicked off for the final time that day, she did her best to remain focussed on the task. Yeah, that was no easy feat, but she could only do her best, and Raven really wanted to do well at this mission, despite how much she hated it.


	4. Chapter 4

The last two-hour session of the day actually lasted nearly two-and-a-half hours due to an unforeseeable squabble between different news syndicates. It was nearly seven by the time the conference closed for the day, and twenty past seven by the time Eeth had managed to politely disentangle himself from the delegates and pick up his waiting padawan.

"Time for dinner," he said. "Normally, I would propose we go to the hotel's dining hall, but there are too many delegates around. Dinner would become endless that way. Let us save that for the official banquet tomorrow and have dinner in our quarters tonight. We still need to talk, after all."

"Agreed," replied Raven, despite not being happy about their pending 'talk'. Force, she was so relieved to be away from the conference and its squabbling delegates that she would have eaten dinner off the lap of a Hutt if it meant getting away from them. Once in their quarters, Raven tossed her saber, belt and all, onto the couch and flopped into a heap next to it. "Even naked they're still boring. Just saying."

The edges of Eeth's mouth curled up in a slight smile. "Yes, they are," he agreed, crossing the room to the terminal where he called up the dinner menu. "And yet, you survived."

"Barely. I barely survived! And I'm still not certain that some sort of permanent damage has not been done as a consequence." Raven lay on the couch and threw her feet up over the backrest. The leg on her trousers slid up due to the upside-down position, bringing her banged-up knee into full view. It was itchy, and so she scratched at it. For a moment, the idea of using the injury to get out of tomorrow's conference crossed her mind. Then again, Eeth was already displeased; shirking her responsibilities on top of that was surely going to exacerbate his displeasure.

Eeth looked up from the terminal just in time to catch Raven at scratching her wound through the bandage.

"Padawan, stop scratching," he snapped. "You might just manage to restart the bleeding. I was going to change the bandage in a moment. Leave the wound alone and let me finish ordering dinner."

He had already picked a typical local dish that he thought Raven might like: a platter of mixed boiled and raw vegetables with various dipping sauces and crisps made of a bluish local tuber. For himself, he ordered spicy grilled fish to go with it.

Raven removed her hand quickly and looked at him from her upside-down vantage point. "Do you think the Trade Federation will create problems?" she asked. They had both identified the Neimoidians as a potential risk to their mission, after all.

Eeth pressed the "send" button and stood to remove his robes and boots.

"No, I do not really think the Trade Federation will stir up trouble," he said. "They are clearly afraid of us, and they lack strong allies, at least as yet. Still, it is always a good idea to remain alert. In any case, I like to think that it is mainly our presence here that prevents them from causing trouble. That way, this assignment gains some purpose."

He put his boots and cloak away and went to the refresher to wash his hands. Then he picked up his medical kit.

"Put up your knee, like you did this afternoon," he instructed, sitting down opposite Raven and pushing a stool over to where Raven was performing her acrobatics.

Raven met him with a wary expression. "Why, what are you going to do to it?" she asked, flipping her legs over her head and rolling to a seated position on the couch.

"I am going to change the bandage and see if you need another shot," replied Eeth. "Roll up your pant leg and rest your foot on the stool."

"I don't need another shot," Raven hastily assured him, yet despite her reluctance to have him check, she did as told.

"I will be the judge of that," Eeth said sternly. "And if I decide that you need another shot, there will be no more theatrics."

Raven gave him a quelling look.

Fortunately, another injection did not turn out to be necessary. The cuts were healing nicely and the infection had abated. Eeth covered the knee in bacta and a fresh bandage. He had just finished doing so when the door chime rang.

"That will be our dinner," Eeth said, standing up. "I will get it. Go and wash your hands. We will talk more about yesterday evening's incident after we have eaten."

"Thanks," Raven said and scrambled off the couch to do as told.

Five minutes later she emerged from her refresher, having washed up and changed into a clean pair of trousers. "Woah, this looks amazing." And it did.

"Borleias has a varied fauna, much of which is edible to humanoids," Eeth replied, "and consequently, the planet is renowned for its vegetable cuisine. Well, and its fish." He pulled the platter of grilled fish towards himself, helped himself to some vegetables and started eating.

"I think I like Borleias, if not the reason we are here," said Raven. It was about the only positive thing she could think of to say about their mission. She was trying not to whine about it too much, but yeah, that was hard when you were tasked with a mission of this, uh, calibre…

They ate in comfortable silence for a while. When it was obvious that Raven was not going to eat much more, Eeth reopened the conversation.

"Padawan, from what you have told me, what happened yesterday was a case of peer pressure, rather than vindictiveness," he said. "And you may be glad that it was. Another incident of petty revenge like the one that caused a certain princess a bout of diarrhoea, and we would be talking about an extended punishment – and on top of that, I would make sure to procure an equivalent of my cane. This is not what I will do today. Nevertheless, succumbing to peer pressure in order to do things that are unbecoming of a Jedi and help others exact their own petty revenge is unacceptable, and you know it. Just suppose for one moment that you would have been caught. What light would that have cast upon us as mediators of this conference? Can you imagine what kind of an effort the Neimoidians would have made to exploit this incident?"

"Yes, I know," Raven replied, and she really did. It just hadn't been something she had given much thought to at the time. Sighing, the padawan slumped her head into her palm. "They might have accused us of sabotage or favouritism, or it might even have given them an excuse to be rid of us. But I said I was sorry, master, why do we have to bring this up again?" Okay, so Raven kinda knew why he was bringing it up, but she hoped that by appearing naive to his intentions, it might cause him to reconsider.

"Because," Eeth replied sternly, "we both know that what you did was unacceptable and that I am going to punish you for it. As you seem disinclined to discuss the issue at any depth and as you seem to have understood your error, we may as well get on with business."

He rose from his chair and went to the closet.

Raven got to her feet, her eyes tracking him as he made for the closet. Had he brought something from the Temple? Surely not. Other than the paddle that he carried with him just about everywhere, Eeth had never brought any type of implement along on their missions before. Unless you counted the fibreglass rod on that last mission to Nar Shaddaa, but that had been part of his disguise!

In fact, Eeth had found on their first day that the hotel stored in the closet a supply of leather slippers for its guests. Eeth never wore slippers, but they had other uses … or at least one other use that he knew of. Slipper in hand, Eeth pulled out a chair from the dining table, sat down and beckoned Raven over. "Bare your backside and bend over," he ordered in a no-nonsense tone of voice, tapping his knee once with the slipper.

Raven paled, yet moved to his side all the same. "Please tell me you aren't going to spank me with a shoe?" Her expression was priceless and had the situation not called for such seriousness, she would have been tempted to make some sort of joke out of it. As it was, this was far from a laughing matter! At least not from Raven's point of view, and it became increasingly less joke-like as she pulled her pants to her knees.

"I am sure it will bring the lesson home quite effectively," Eeth said, stony-faced. "Get over my lap."

"Aw," the padawan groaned. She wanted to pitch a fit but really, what was the point? It was not like it had ever worked. Resigned, she reluctantly put herself across his lap. Raven hated this, not to mention that it was adding insult to injury that she had to do so willingly. Even though Raven was quite small and lithe, this position wasn't exactly comfortable either; all the blood ran to her head, and she felt vulnerable.

Eeth did not leave Raven much time to contemplate her position. He raised the slipper high above his head and brought it down onto his padawan's left buttock with a resounding crack. He waited a second, allowing for the impact to register, then repeated the process with the right buttock. He then settled into a slow, steady rhythm, swinging the slipper with considerable force.

"Yeowwch! Masterrr, OW!" Raven protested as the initial numbness wore off, only to be replaced by a white-hot explosion of pain. Raven had never been spanked with a slipper before. In fact, she did not even wear slippers and at that moment silently vowed to lose her toes to frostbite before willingly bringing such an effective weapon within ten city blocks of Eeth. By the sixth lick she was sniffling, and by the tenth, there were tears; this hurt more than she would ever have imagined. It was a shoe, for the Force's sake!

Eeth now did something that he hardly ever did: he paused the spanking in order to lecture.

"Padawan, I put my trust in you by allowing you to go to the beach and meet your peers without adult supervision," he said sternly. "If the kind of misguided behaviour you displayed yesterday is the result, I will not be able to give my permission to such requests again. Am I making myself clear?" He punctuated his words with a sharp swat to the undercurve of his padawan's bottom.

Any relief Raven felt over the fact that he had stopped swatting went out the window when he tagged her undercurve with that horrid thing. "Yeooesss! CLEAR!" Raven wailed, twisting and trying to snake her left hand up to cover her backside. That one had gotten her full attention, and she wasn't keen on getting any more.

"Good," said Eeth matter-of-factly while pinning Raven's hand to her back with his left effortlessly. "I hope you think of this the next time you are tempted to listen to your peers and do what you know is wrong."

With this, he resumed the assault on his padawan's bottom at the same slow, measured pace as before, leaving her just enough time to really feel the impact of each stroke, but not enough to recover from it. He dealt out another eight powerful swats, focussing on the area on which his padawan eventually would have to sit.

Okay, so this had been pretty bad, yet when Eeth started targeting where ass met thigh, desperation took precedence and all rational thought was abandoned in lieu of pleading, begging and crying. Despite knowing that her efforts fell on deaf ears, she continued to howl shamelessly, doing anything and everything in her power that might make him stop. By the time he laid down the eighth smack, Raven had lost the freedom of both hands and was sobbing unintelligible promises of stellar behaviour for the rest of her born days and possibly including the afterlife.

Eeth dealt out one last, almighty blow to the backs of her thighs, dropped the slipper and waited for her to regain her composure, or at least some semblance of it.

"If you do something like this again," he informed her as soon as she seemed to be able to hear a word, "tonight's spanking will seem like a walk in the park compared to what you are going to receive then."

"I w-wooonntt," she hiccupped, not caring that a trail of snot and tears had run into her hair. Her ass had its very own heartbeat and burned as if nothing that existed in the natural world could possibly relieve it. That wasn't true, of course; it was how she felt at this moment, though.

"Alright, padawan, it's over," Eeth said quietly, helping her up and handing her a handkerchief. "You may clean yourself up now. Be back in the common room in ten minutes."

Still crying, Raven accepted the handkerchief, blew her nose, gave a nod and wordlessly retreated to the safety of her refresher where she proceeded to sit on the tiles. It was bliss. Raven's ass was on fire, although upon closer inspection there did not appear to be much in the way of damage. Oh, it was certainly red enough. Her ass matched the red hand towel by the sink with surprising accuracy! However, apart from that, and a few pale ovals, she was no worse for wear.

Five minutes later, Raven returned to the common room to find Eeth sitting at the dining table sipping from one of two cups set out. The slipper was nowhere to be seen. The thing was horrid, and she briefly entertained the idea of being rid of it lest he ever try to use it on her again. Moving to stand before him, the padawan waited, hoping to all hopes that he was done punishing her, and nervously played with the hem on her sleep shirt.

Eeth took Raven's hand and pulled her towards him gently, offering her a hug.

"Padawan, I consider this incident closed," he said solemnly. "However, any more misuse of the leeway I grant you, and there will be no more leeway for quite some time. Are we clear on that?"

"Yes, master," Raven replied, her cheeks flushing guiltily at his words. She had not meant to take advantage of the freedom, but in hindsight, that was exactly how it looked. Leaning into his chest, the padawan rested her head on his shoulder, planning on enjoying his comfort for as long as he would offer it.

Eeth put his arms around Raven and was content to stay like that for several minutes. He sensed a certain weariness in her and, although he was loath to admit it, he was feeling quite tired himself. Finally, he said gently, "I think our tea is getting cold. And it is definitely time for evening meditation. Do you need me to perform some healing on your bottom in order to be able to sleep?"

"Yes, please," Raven replied. She was no longer sniffling but was almost falling asleep on her feet. She did not want to meditate, her ass hurt, and she was tired, but Force, neither would there be any arguments over it.

It took some stern admonishments from Eeth to make Raven stay focussed during their fifteen minutes of meditation. However, he was not going to skip this ritual if he could avoid it. It helped maintain their connection to the Force and to each other, and it provided structure and mental discipline. Besides, part of being a Jedi was to overcome one's physical limits, including fatigue, exhaustion or pain. It was simply an integral part of Raven's training.

A little while later, Raven was fast asleep. Eeth pondered working on a report for a while longer but he was unaccountably exhausted and his limbs were feeling a little heavier than usual. Maybe these were the aftereffects of yesterday's swim? In any case, he decided to listen to his body and go to sleep.

The following morning, he felt better – and surprisingly thirsty. He drank several glasses of water and took his time getting ready for the day. At seven o'clock, he woke Raven who groaned at the familiar figure standing by the door. Resistance was futile, though, and so the padawan rolled herself out of bed and got into the shower without complaint despite feeling extra tired today. She had one leg in her bikini bottoms when a thought occurred to her: would Eeth allow her to go swimming after the whole pink dye debacle? Would it be pushing it to even ask? The girl pondered this for a while before pulling her sleep shirt over her bikini and going to find out.

Raven found Eeth sitting cross-legged, meditating in a patch of sunlight by the sliding glass doors. He looked so peaceful, so still. It was hard to believe it was the same master who had whaled the ass off her the night before, or who had fought and killed fulfilling his duty as a Jedi, but it was. Smiling, she crept to his side, knelt and closed her eyes. The sun felt warm on her face and brought up thoughts of swimming in the ocean, playing vossball, trekking through jungles and scaling tropical mountain ranges. The girl sighed: would it ever get easier to quiet her mind? She opened one eye to find Eeth's serene visage just as motionless and tranquil as before. "Show-off!" she sent good-naturedly through their bond.

Eeth ignored the mental comment, but dropped his shields and allowed her to connect with his Force presence, which was the first step in a meditation designed to develop and strengthen their bond.

"Let us work on communicating through our bond," he projected to her. "You have made great progress with that lately." They had not yet reached the stage where they could exchange complex messages, but Raven would usually get his meaning and he would get hers.

After twenty minutes of meditation, he called the exercise to a halt. "Would you like a swim before breakfast, or are you very hungry?" he asked his padawan.

"Would I like to swim? That was a rhetorical question, right?" Raven said, pulling up her sleep shirt to reveal that she was already clad in her bikini. She was most definitely not hungry. In fact, the idea of breakfast seemed to make her feel slightly queasy. Shaking this off, the padawan jumped to her feet and ran to get a towel.

On their way to the beach, Raven looked up at Eeth. "Thanks for letting me. I, uh, well. I know you said it was finished, but I didn't think you would let me do anything else fun after I dyed that Farghul delegate pink," she admitted.

"This is not fun, it is exercise," Eeth said severely, and the fact that he was slightly unsure whether he actually meant what he said hardly showed. "Besides, I do not want you bouncing off the walls all day."

Raven snorted but said nothing more about it as they made their way down to the beach which was nearly deserted at this time of the day. Eeth immediately challenged Raven to a race. Some vigorous physical activity would curb his padawan's restlessness, which might help prevent any further misbehaviour, he assumed.

All too soon, however, he had to usher her out of the water. Raven was giving him a pleading look that spoke volumes because despite what he'd said about it being exercise and not fun, she'd had a ball. "No, padawan, we may not stay longer," Eeth replied firmly to the unspoken request. "We need to take a quick shower, dry our hair, get dressed and have a quick breakfast. So get going."

"Aww, the fun police has arrived," Raven complained, but it was half-hearted at best, and she did as told without fuss.

With her usual morning ritual out of the way, Raven entered the common room where Eeth was waiting at the table. "I'm ready," she said, slumping into a chair while hastily finishing off her braid.

Eeth was just pouring himself a cup of tea. He had ordered a quick breakfast of fruit, cereal and tea, and they had fifteen minutes left to eat if they made their way to the conference room quickly.

"I think I had better redo your braid," he commented, glancing at Raven. "It looks rather messy. But have some breakfast first."

"Messy?" Raven pulled it around to see. Okay, so it was a bit bumpy, and the strands she'd taken were uneven. Still… "I don't see why I have to be so formal. It's not like they pay any attention to me at all. I mean, I could walk in wearing Nar Shaddaa garb, and nobody would notice."

"Oh, but they would," Eeth said calmly, starting to spoon up his cereal. "As soon as you do not meet their expectations, they will take notice. And there is no need for you to test that statement; if you do not believe me, ask Lakhri. He has. Now start eating, or you will have to go to the morning session on an empty stomach."

He has? How? When? Raven wanted to know, but settled for: "What did he do?" Because stories about Lakhri always turned out to be entertaining. She wasn't at all hungry, yet ate anyway; pissing Eeth off this early on in the day over something as trivial as eating her breakfast was never a good start to any day.

"Nothing particularly outrageous," said Eeth. "Yet it was provocative, under the circumstances. We were conducting extensive peace negotiations and I had quite a similar conversation with him as I had with you just now. Lakhri claimed that he might as well stay in bed, since nobody would notice whether he was there anyway. I warned him not to even think about trying it. So he did not. However, he came to the next session wearing street clothes. No gaudy colours or anything particularly flashy; just plain street clothes. Yet, people did notice. Half the session, they seemed to be busy discussing whether he had simply stained his robes with coffee or whether I had chucked him out."

Raven smiled at Lakhri's story and could just imagine the man doing something like that – not that she would blame him as similar things had crossed her mind.

As expected, today's conference sessions were as dull as the previous day's, and unfortunately, taking a place at Eeth's side did not improve Raven's view. That said, she did utilise each coffee break to its full extent to get some fresh air and walk around the gardens, being mindful to set her alarm each time in order to be back before they restarted the session. After all, it would be rather difficult to hide tardiness while she was seated right next to Eeth.

Thankful that today was the day they broke ninety minutes early, Raven did as she had done the previous day and waited patiently until Eeth finished being bombarded with questions by delegates. Then she practically cart-wheeled back to their room.

The banquet was to begin at seven, so she took a quick shower, dressed in clean robes and brushed her hair. She was busy making a neat braid as Eeth entered, looking immaculate as usual. "Is this going to be as boring as the rest of today?" she asked, smoothing a few wrinkles from her tunic.

"I am afraid so," Eeth replied, "but at least you will not have to listen to a lot of speeches except, unfortunately, mine. I promise to keep that one short, though. The food is usually good. I have requested a vegetarian meal for you, so you need not worry about being expected to eat fish. Oh, and the dinner will be held in the hotel's garden, which is quite pretty. After dinner, the guests will get up and engage in small talk. If that bores you, you may leave inconspicuously, but only to return to our quarters."

He checked his padawan over, found her appearance satisfactory and led her to the hotel gardens where a number of tables were set up under the starry sky. He and Raven were seated in the midst of the chief delegates who were currently discussing their latest vacations – always a safe topic when politics were out of the question, but not one to which the typical Jedi had much to contribute.

Given the diversity of species present, Raven's meal did not draw a second glance from anyone but herself. "Thank you, master," she whispered when the colourful plate of grilled vegetable pasta topped with herbs and a side dish of clear soup were placed in front of her. Thanks to Eeth's consideration, the padawan enjoyed the food, even if her appetite was still lacking. She managed to tune out most of the conversation going on around her; that was until she heard her name mentioned and glanced up into the enquiring eyes of an unmistakably pink Farghul.

"Uh, Delegate Caldman." She cleared her throat. "Would you repeat that, please?" The cat-like humanoid frowned slightly, yet did as asked. He wanted to know which part of the conference she had enjoyed most so far, and Raven wondered if telling him the truth was wise or not. Yeah, probably not. "Well, some of the disputes where all parties involved got what they wanted have been satisfying," she settled on, which seemed to please the man.

After the main dish, Eeth, as was expected of him, rose and gave a short speech. As promised, it was just long enough not to be thought insulting, but no longer than that. He welcomed everyone officially, thanked them for their attendance and for the constructive discussions led so far, expressed his gratitude – also on behalf of the Jedi Order – for being asked to moderate the conference and his hope for a fruitful outcome. After a polite applause, he sat down and dessert was served.

Finally, about ninety minutes after they had entered the garden, everyone had finished eating. The delegates started to stand up and join each other in groups, with waiters serving drinks and snacks.

"It would be polite to stay for a little while longer," Eeth murmured into Raven's ear. "After twenty minutes or so, you may leave discreetly if you want to." He could sense that she was tired, and he had rather excuse her from the remainder of the banquet than risk her falling asleep during the conference tomorrow.

"Yes, master," the padawan replied, and then she grinned at him. "If only all their speeches were as concise as yours, perhaps this conference would not be so tedious. Maybe you should offer to hold a seminar on that before we leave?" she suggested, knowing that he would catch the compliment buried in her statement. Eeth gave her a small smile and turned towards the Corellian delegation who were just approaching him.

As per instructions, Raven tolerantly endured another twenty minutes of uninteresting conversations. Then, after receiving a nod from Eeth, she inconspicuously exited the dining area and started for their apartment. The night air was fresh, and the dark violet sky shimmered with more stars than she had known existed. Unsurprisingly, by the time Raven reached the door, she did not want to go inside. It was simply too beautiful a night to waste indoors, and there was no telling when she would be privy to such a sight again. Well, at least that was her justification as she bypassed the front door and slipped into the garden adjacent to stargaze.

Eeth did not exactly enjoy small talk, but there was no way for him to avoid it so he tried to make use of the time by gaining insight into the economic and political interests of the delegations. At least it gave this evening some purpose. Knowing that it would look strange if he, as the moderator of the conference, left early, he stayed for about two hours until a little more than half of the delegates had retired. When this was the case, he decided that it would be acceptable to leave as well. He returned to their quarters, hoping that Raven would have made use of the time to meditate and get ready for bed.

Raven was indeed back in their quarters, dressed and ready for bed by the time Eeth arrived; she had not wanted to spend all night in the garden as she had not exactly sought out Eeth's permission. Besides, as loath as she was to admit it, she was feeling worn out.

"Hello, padawan," said Eeth, hanging his cloak onto the coat rack and pulling off his boots. "Is everything alright? Have you already performed your evening meditation?"

"Of course everything is alright," Raven replied, putting her hand over her heart to feign wounded feelings. "Why, were you expecting to return and find me missing, the place nothing but rubble? It can be arranged, you know." Raven was messing with him. Yeah, well, teasing her master was often hit and miss but that didn't stop her from trying it on.

Eeth raised his eyebrows. "So I take it you have not performed your evening meditation yet?" he said drily.

"No, master," Raven replied, equally drily. "I will do it now." His lack of humour was not unexpected. Actually, it was kind of amusing in its own right. The edge of her lip curled into a crooked smile at that thought.

Eeth returned the smile, almost imperceptibly. "We can do it together," Eeth offered. "Shall we go to one of the gardens and make it a moving meditation?" Maybe that would help with the heaviness he still felt in his limbs.

"Force, yes!" came the predictable response. Raven would choose moving meditation over the seated kind any day.

Five minutes later, the padawan emerged from her bedroom. She had redressed in loose-fitting training clothes and was carrying her lightsaber, a huge smile on her face.

Eeth chose a segment of the seventh kata and started performing it, allowing his body to execute the moves by rote and letting his mind flow into a state of meditative trance. He enjoyed sharing meditations with his padawan. These were the moments in which he felt at peace with her and with the Force.

The seventh kata was one Raven knew well, which was why Eeth had chosen it; the moves flowed without conscious thought and allowed her to blend with Eeth's movements easily. When he called the exercise to an end, Raven resisted the urge to ask for more time. He had done so many things that he need not do as a Jedi master to make such a boring mission bearable for her, and she felt a stab of guilt at her seemingly endless ability to find trouble.

Eeth picked up on that feeling and patted her shoulder briefly as he led her inside. He felt quite relaxed now and ready to finish the conference. Maybe, if his padawan behaved very well, he would even allow for an additional day to explore the planet. For now, though, both of them needed to sleep. There must be something about the seasonal climate that made them very tired. And thirsty. They shared another jug of water between them before Eeth tucked Raven in.

"Thanks for letting me off easy today," she said sincerely. "I know I probably didn't deserve to swim this morning, and you could have made me stay for the whole banquet tonight, and you didn't. I just wanted you to know that I am grateful."

"You are very welcome, padawan," Eeth said gently, giving her a rare smile. "One more long day, and then the worst will be over. If you manage to behave yourself, I might ask the Temple to grant us an additional day in order to explore the jungle. The wildlife is quite spectacular."

Raven fell asleep that night smiling. The mission might not be of the sort she would remember, at least not for the right reasons, yet Lakhri had been correct: Borleias was certainly not without its perks!


	5. Chapter 5

Raven was dreaming about exploring the jungles with Eeth when suddenly it became very bright and sunny. A little too sunny given that they were in the shade beneath a giant canopy of— She looked up and squinted because since when did the canopy grow giant legs and start moving? Startled into consciousness, the padawan sat bolt upright in her bed, a hand flying up to block out the light. "Imooda!" she gasped. Upon seeing Eeth standing in her door, she added cheekily: "Well, I was close," and threw her legs out of bed. "I'm going; I'm going." Crazy dream notwithstanding, Raven was not totally dreading this day as she had some fun planned during the conference breaks.

Eeth nodded and left Raven to change into workout clothes. This morning, he took her to the beach for a brief sparring session. He did not want her to get out of practice, and it was a good opportunity for her to gather experience with sparring on sand. He had not worked out in sand in quite a while, it seemed; it slowed him down more than he would have thought. Or maybe it was the sun, which was unusually hot given the time of day. After twenty minutes, both of them were drenched in sweat and quite glad to return to the hotel to shower.

They had a quick breakfast of porridge with local fruit, whereupon they headed towards the conference room for another long day of sessions.

"Only one more long day," Raven repeated Eeth's words from the previous night as they made their way into the conference room that was already full of chattering delegates.

"Exactly," Eeth said with a small smile. "You will survive, padawan."

Raven made to point out that this was a matter of opinion when several delegates came to greet them. Her lip twitched into a slight smile, and she sent it across their bond instead.

Eeth merely raised his eyebrows at her and pointed her to her seat. He politely asked the delegates to take their seats as well and opened the proceedings immediately. No point in having them last any longer than necessary! A sentiment with which Raven whole-heartedly agreed. Besides, today she had something to look forward to and wanted to get this over with as soon as possible.

They say that a watched pot never boils, and sure enough, the morning was set to truly draaaag out from the get-go. Raven noticed a vague sense of collective weariness coming from about half the delegation today, yet that was hardly strange given that the delegates from the Trade Federation were going out of their way to fuss over every detail, more so than was typical, even for them. Naturally, this eventually led to a whole lot of long-ass debates, some of which escalated into shit-slinging matches or, at one stage, outright squabbling. At one point, the padawan thought that if Bane Turgan opened his mouth to contest one more statement, Eeth might have to physically prise Kyle Caldman's feline claws from his neck.

By the time morning break came around, everyone was well and truly ready for one! Not that Raven cared; she was out the door like a flash the second Eeth granted permission. Delta beach hosted various activities daily, yet so far none of them had been to Raven's taste: basket making, fishing, kiddy treasure hunts, jewellery crafting. Yuck! Today, however, they had a mini-pod racing track set up. Yeah! This was more like it. It also helped that, given the course took so long to set up, they ran the event for the entire day. That meant that Raven would get an opportunity to ride during each conference break.

Well, almost… It seemed as if the lunch break was going to be an exception!

"Masterrrr, please be reasonable about this," Raven protested as Eeth pointed to the seat opposite him. "I'm not even hungry." That much was indeed true; she was not hungry in the slightest. Besides, after the fun she'd had this morning, she was also desperate to get back to the podrace.

"Irrelevant," said Eeth curtly. "You need to eat. Order some soup if you feel like having a light lunch, but you WILL order something." In fact, Eeth was going to order some soup himself, preferably cold soup because the heat was sweltering. It made him thirsty, rather than hungry, and he supposed the same went for Raven. Yet, eating at least a small meal was the reasonable thing to do.

Raven leant back in her chair and folded her arms, shooting him a glare. "I'm not being obstinate, I'm just not hungry. It's the heat, isn't it doing the same thing to you?" she challenged because all she wanted to do was drink lately.

"It is," said Eeth. "And yet, I will have some soup because I know my body needs food. The same goes for yours. This is not open for debate. Order something and eat it, or I will order something for you and you will still eat it."

Raven continued to glare at him. That was until a droid rolled up to take their order and Eeth started speaking. Quickly, she sat up and started skimming through the menu, clicking on a soup made from some local savoury fruit and seasoned with mild spices. "This one, please," she said when Eeth paused. Eeth gave a curt nod and passed her order on to the droid. Then he poured himself another glass of water.

"I have been to Borleias any number of times, but it has never been this hot," he said.

"Why do you think it's so hot this time? I mean, it's making me feel fuzzy and tired. Of course, I don't have any real experience to base a comparison on here. I have no idea how I react to super hot planets." The latter was certainly true. Raven had been raised in the Jedi Temple on Coruscant and could count the number of times she had left that climate on her hands.

"I suppose we are just unlucky," said Eeth. "I normally cope well with heat, being from a desert species, but the humidity here is higher than I feel comfortable with. We might go for a swim tonight. – Ah, thank you."

A waiter placed two bowls of soup and a basket of bread in front of them. Eeth helped himself to some more water and started eating.

"Please do not dawdle," he said to Raven. "Lunch break is short."

"Yeah, it's about the only thing about this conference that is," Raven replied, sipping from her soup. It wasn't terrible, far from it, but nor did she have an appetite.

The atmosphere in the conference hall continued to deteriorate as the afternoon wore on. Everyone was on the defensive thanks to the Trade Federation delegates who, for some reason, had something to say about just about everything today. They were pissing people off. Heck, they were even pissing Raven off, and she couldn't have cared less about this ridiculous conference. It was her duty to make sure it was completed satisfactorily, though, which was why the padawan sat quietly and continued to concentrate despite wanting to fry the lot of them with Force lightning. Eeth was well able to handle them, fortunately, and it took no more than a few words from him to restore order to the proceedings.

By the time their final break came around that afternoon, most of the delegates were looking weary. Conversely, Raven had just come alive. There was pod racing to be done here! It was all she could do not to bounce and fidget as she waited for Eeth to catch her eye so she could leave. She desperately needed a break as, in addition to the boredom, bickering and general unpleasantness of this conference, scanning the delegates for possible trouble was mentally draining.

Eeth had no time to so much as glance at Raven since he was immediately beleaguered by delegates who asked him to do something about the Trade Federation's interference with the proceedings. He listened to their concerns – which he happened to share, but could do little about at this point – attentively. As he did so, he briefly rested a hand on Raven's shoulder and signalled to her through their bond to go outside and get some fresh air. He had no doubt she would pick up the unspoken message.

She did, and although it felt a bit unfair to leave Eeth to deal with all of this, there was honestly nothing more that she could do to help other than to keep out of trouble and do the job he'd assigned. Thus, Raven left the conference hall discreetly, breathing a sigh of relief as she stepped out into the afternoon air. It was hot, but there was a slight cool breeze that seemed to offset that, if only slightly.

Five minutes later, Raven was strapped into her choice of podracer, queued and waiting for her turn to hit the course. Apparently, the driver with the fastest lap time would be announced at the end of the day, but Raven had no idea what the prize was. Anyway, it wasn't the prize that she wanted here. It was the thrill of piloting mini podracers! Thankfully, the starts were timed so that despite having a full track, the pods were spaced out well enough to avoid crashes. Well, for the most part. There were still a few prangs, but the pods were designed to keep their occupants safe.

Their afternoon break went for forty-five minutes, so the moment her first race ended, Raven jumped directly into the queue for a second round. No break in between meant that there would be just enough time for three runs before she had to return to the conference.

As Raven moved into pole position for the final time, she spotted Bree and, judging by their similar height and appearance, her family, standing by the sidelines watching. She waved, but they were too far away to see her. Raven hadn't run into anyone from the bonfire again since that evening. She checked her rear mirrors but recognised none of the people behind her from the bonfire night. They were mostly older teenagers and their parents, the majority of the latter looking none too pleased with being roped into this. Raven imagined the look of distaste on Eeth's face should she have asked him to try squashing himself into one of these mini racers. She chuckled. And it was at that moment that tree began flashing amber, counting her down.

Okay, so Raven had never had so much fun in her life because, despite the layer of bumper attached, the pods were fast! The controls were familiar to her now, and so she pushed the thrusters to full and gave it her all. She was drifting around the second to last bend that led off the beach and on to the home straight when suddenly her pod was on its side, skidding directly for another pod. Great, apparently someone had lost control and cut across the middle of the track, taking her out in the process. That she had failed to sense the collision in time to avoid it was disturbing, yet Raven was too busy trying not to wipe out the other driver to contemplate that right now.

With a little ingenuity and some help from the Force, Raven's pod finally collided with a safety barrier and stopped. Well, that had sucked, but at least the other driver had escaped. Disappointed, the padawan popped the exit hatch and rolled herself out. That had been her last run, too! Huffing, she got to her feet and moved behind the safety barriers. A track car would be around to pick her up shortly, so all she could do now was wait. It was then that she felt something wet on the back of her pants and looked down to discover that she had rolled out of her pod right through a skid of mud that someone had flicked up from the side of the track. The back of her robes were not only wet but also covered in brown muck. And as if that weren't enough to contend with, the safety car had deemed the out-of-control driver a priority and was towing him back first. Raven looked at her watch and swore. She had only ten minutes to get back to the conference!

By the time Raven was back at the starting line, the conference had already been going for five minutes. Okay, so Raven was torn here. Eeth would have a heart attack if she rocked up to the conference looking like the victim of a tsunami! Yet, experience had taught her that the later she was, the worse Eeth came down on her: every minute that she spent on washing up and changing into clean clothes would mean more punishment! Decision made, Raven started running.

Exactly seven and a half minutes later, the apprentice arrived at the conference hall, panting. It took her longer than it should to catch her breath, and she was sweating, both of which were unusual for her. Still, she managed to compose herself and decided it would be best to enter through the fire escape, which was right up the back of the auditorium. This way, it would be easy to slip in and take a seat without being noticed by anyone. Eeth would notice, of course, but that was, unfortunately, a given. What Raven didn't anticipate was that the fire doors were alarmed. So as she entered, the entire building was filled with a loud BEEP! BEEP! BEEP! Force, it was fucking deafening, and she covered her ears as every delegate in the hall turned to see what had caused the racket. Well, at least they were no longer bickering.

Eeth, who was already seriously irritated by his padawan's failure to return from her break on time, pointed a glare at her that would have burned a hole through Hoth. He motioned for one of the service droids and asked it to turn off the alarm, then beckoned Raven over to himself, pointing at the free chair next to him. As she started moving down the aisle, some of the delegates started whispering and chuckling. Only when Raven approached the podium did Eeth realise that she was covered in mud.

"Ladies, gentlemen, let us vote on the proposal by the government of Alderaan," he said loudly, standing, which effectively drew attention from Raven and back to the proceedings. He paid her no further mind but the surge of disapproval he sent her through their bond made it clear that they were going to discuss this incident later and, unless she had one hell of a good excuse, it was not going to be a pleasant discussion, at least not for Raven.

Ooookay, so that had all gone about as bad as it possibly could have. Still, being Eeth's apprentice, Raven kept her chin up and did her best to look dignified despite her mud-slathered appearance. She sat beside Eeth without comment, although his disapproval across their bond had her lowering her gaze to the table.

By nightfall, everyone was exhausted and rather tired of the Neimoidians. The Trade Federation's constant interventions had prolonged the proceedings considerably; it was at least an hour past schedule that Eeth called the session to a close. For once, nobody seemed to be interested in talking to him. They all were rather keen to leave for dinner, or possibly bed.

"Come, padawan," Eeth said in a voice that betrayed no emotions and swept towards their rooms, expecting Raven to follow.

When they had entered, he hung up his cloak and pulled off his boots. Then he beckoned for her to sit on the couch. He took a seat opposite her, fixed her with his patented glare and said coolly, "Padawan, you arrived more than ten minutes late to the last session, and to say that the state of your uniform drew attention would be an understatement. Were you trying to test my claim that the delegates do indeed notice your presence or do you have a more valid excuse for your behaviour than that?"

By this stage, the mud on her uniform had dried. Also, it helped that during the looooong last session, she had spent a lot of her time picking it off as it did so. "If I say yes, will you be less displeased or more so?" the padawan wanted to know.

"Padawan, you are not in any position to negotiate," snapped Eeth. "I want a truthful answer. Period."

Raven looked at him with a pained expression. "I wasn't testing anything. I got wiped out by some crazy driver in the last race and was stranded on the far side of the track. I had to wait for the safety car to come get me," she explained. "I ran directly to the conference as soon as I got back, though. I didn't even bother to change because I knew you'd be displeased if I were late." Which translated to, "a dirty uniform was better than extra swats for the minutes it took to change." Not that Raven was planning to divulge the rationale behind that particular choice.

"And you thought I would be less displeased if you showed up late AND all covered in mud?" asked Eeth, raising his eyebrows.

"Well, yes. If I had got changed, I would have been much later."

"True," said Eeth. "However, if you had arrived twenty or thirty minutes late, in a normal uniform and through the customary entrance door, I could have easily made it look as if I expected you to arrive late due to an errand you were running for me or for whatever reason. Nobody would have paid it much attention. Instead, you set off an alarm trying to enter through the back door and drew everyone's attention to your… peculiar appearance. In short, by trying to avoid more trouble for yourself, you created more trouble for both of us."

"I didn't mean to cause trouble for us. I was just…" Raven paused, not wanting to admit that she had been trying to save herself additional punishment. "Just trying to be inconspicuous about it. If the door hadn't been alarmed, I could have sat down somewhere at the back, and nobody would have been any the wiser."

"Your reasoning involves a lot of 'if's," said Eeth pointedly. "Has it occurred to you that, if doing that last race was such a close call, you should not have done it at all?"

"Master, c'mon. It was just this one time. Force knows when another opportunity like that will pop up. Probably never! I didn't know I was going to get wiped out and end up looking like this. If I have to plan for every eventuality, I may as well not leave at all." She threw her hands up to emphasise the hopelessness of her situation.

"Nonsense," said Eeth brusquely. "You know very well that I gave you permission to go to the beach during break. However, I expected you to keep the mission in mind and make it your priority. Thus, while you are certainly not able to plan for every eventuality, you should leave enough room in your schedule for some of them. And if something unforeseen does happen, I expect you to handle the situation with a view on the best possible outcome for our mission, rather than your bottom. Is that what you did?"

Raven looked at him for a long moment but could think of nothing to get herself out of this. "Uh, no. But … Neither did I want to end up with thirty swats!" she admitted. Because, well heck! Could he really blame her for that? Her nose wrinkled and she fidgeted with the hem on her sleeve.

"Padawan, as always, I would have allowed you to explain," said Eeth severely. "If you had taken the time to change into clean clothes and told me about it, I would certainly not have given you one swat per minute you were late because of that. As it is, I am less than happy about your priorities. You need to put the mission first, always. And just so you remember that the next time temptation arises, you will receive a harder punishment than what I would have dealt out if you had merely arrived late. Fetch me the slipper."

"But, wait, I didn't know that it wouldn't have been worse! I was just…" Uh, trying to manipulate the situation into getting a lesser punishment for herself?! Yeah. Raven wasn't about to admit to that aloud, even if Eeth had worked it out. Thus, she stood abruptly, changing tactics. "I just wasn't thinking. Please, master, can't you take that into consideration? Please." Because the last thing Raven wanted right now was to have her ass handed to her with the slipper from hell.

The look on Eeth's face darkened further, if that was even possible.

"If that is really true," he said coldly. "I need to encourage you to make more of an effort to think. Thinking about your actions is part of your job description, padawan. Now do as I told you and fetch me the slipper."

"Awww!" Raven whined, bouncing a few times to further demonstrate her reluctance. She did not want to feel that thing again; it had hurt like a fucker. Yet, what choices were there? Complain and probably end up getting worse, or go get the thing and be done with it. Resigned, the padawan took the logical route and went to do as told. Naturally, Raven dragged it out as much as possible, but before long she was standing before him once again. Raven folded her arms, not wanting what was going to happen next.

Slipper in hand, Eeth rose from the couch. "Bare your bottom and bend over the table," he ordered. This was a position he used relatively rarely, mostly only for serious punishments involving the cane or strap. But he had promised her a harsher punishment than what she would have received for mere tardiness, and having her bent over the table would significantly increase his swing which, combined with the sting of the slipper, would leave quite an impression.

Raven's brows pinched together and rose into a pitiful look at receiving that order. It was bad enough having to go over his knee, but this? Yeah, this was going to be worse. Begging and pleading had never worked in the past, though, so again, there were no good options here. Huffing, the padawan moved to their dining table and slid out a chair, undid her belt and pulled her pants and underwear to her knees. She wanted to beg and plead, to give him puppy dog eyes, really she did! But this had never worked, and so she sucked in a breath, mustered her courage and laid her chest onto the table.

Without losing time, Eeth stepped up behind Raven, raised the slipper high and brought it down onto her bottom in a swat that reverberated across the room. He wanted to get this over with; among other things, he was thirsty.

"AHHOwwchhh!" Raven barked, surprised at the force he had put into that. The surprise was short-lived, however, as the next few were no less impressive and drew wails that increased in desperation and volume with each. By the sixth, Raven was gripping the edge of their table for grim death, twisting at the waist and both hips were pressed into the table in an effort at putting more distance between her ass and that horrid thing.

Eeth, however, had promised her a memorable lesson and he was going to deliver on that promise. This was less about her podracing accident and subsequent tardiness and much more about her priorities. Just to make sure that Raven understood this, he paused briefly and said, "Padawan, just so we are clear about this. What earned you this punishment is not the fact that you turned up late due to an unforeseen accident. For that, I might have given you a few swats with the paddle and might have admonished you to better organise your time during conference breaks. No, what I am unhappy with is your priorities, by which you turned an incident that could otherwise easily have been shrugged off into a major source of embarrassment. I would be very surprised if the Trade Federation were not trying to exploit it right this moment. You need to think about the broader repercussions of your actions before pondering whether you are in trouble with me. If you neglect to do so, you will just be in more trouble. As I am trying to demonstrate right now."

With this, he raised the slipper again and slapped it across the undercurve of her bottom, leaving a white oval in its wake.

Right now, the idea of receiving a few swats with the small paddle Eeth kept in his belt seemed almost pleasant, and it was, compared to what followed! Raven let out a yowl that was possibly heard in the West Wing, and then she started sniffling. It stung, burned and ached all at once. "I'm sorryyy!" she said through sniffles, her hips still twisting because apologising had never gotten her in additional trouble, even if he didn't want to hear it.

"Good," said Eeth grimly, not letting up on her in the slightest. He was certainly not going to stop before he had completed the dozen. And he was making every single swat count.

Raven continued to twist and writhe but it had no effect on redirecting where the next swat landed. By the eighth she had started to cry, and by the tenth, her cries had turned into desperate wails. Raven was sweating now, which was strange as, although this was seriously painful, it was not the cane. Still, her self-control was dwindling with each swat.

Eeth meant to put a restraining hand on his padawan's back, but it inadvertently turned into more of a comforting pat; he could not help but pick up on her desperation.

The comfort was appreciated, and although his hand did little more than offer some gentle pressure, Raven stilled and tried to get her cries under control.

"Two more, padawan," Eeth said quietly. He dealt out the two remaining swats quickly, giving Raven no chance to inadvertently get up, and then dropped the slipper. He was going to return it to the cupboard later; right now, he was more preoccupied with comforting his distraught padawan.

Raven yelped and squealed as the last two swats landed, and then she fell limp over the table and cried for all she was worth. Truth be told, she had received worse punishments in the past, but this seemed to hurt all the more. Maybe it was because this was her fourth mission, and she was still making the wrong decisions! Well, Raven had kinda known it was the wrong choice, that she should have returned to change first. But again, she'd tried to lessen the consequences of her decisions, and it had backfired which only added to the pity party. Plus, the climate here was positively draining! Altogether, the padawan wasn't happy, and it showed in the depth of her sobs as she stood and turned to face Eeth.

Eeth pulled Raven into a hug. He had been planning to follow up on this punishment by making her write an essay on getting her priorities straight during missions, but somehow, sensing her exhaustion and distress, he could not quite bring himself to doing it. "Lakhri is right," he thought, torn between amusement and dismay, "I must have a soft spot for her."

"Have you learned anything from this, padawan?" he asked, his calm voice not betraying his thoughts.

Eeth's hug brought unstuck what little composure Raven had managed to muster. She cried into his tunic, unburdening her frustrations, self-pity and the general sense of discomfort she'd felt since they had started mediating this blasted conference! As a result, it took her a minute or two to answer him, but when she did, the padawan pulled away and did her best to stand tall. "I should put the m-mission f-first," she hiccupped, only just managing to keep her chin raised. Her face was a hot mess, although most of the snot and tears had wiped off on Eeth's tunic.

Eeth nodded. "Yes," he said. "I hope that this is a lesson you will take from this punishment. Now, I think it is high time you went to bed and got some sleep. Go get changed into your pyjamas. I will order us a few sandwiches and some drinks in the meanwhile. I will perform some healing on your bottom after we have eaten."

He nearly always provided healing after a harsh punishment like this one, but he usually waited for some time before he did so which, in his opinion, helped to let the message sink in.

For once, Raven didn't feel like going to bed was such a bad idea. She was tired, and now she was sore to boot.

As always, the bathroom tiles were a cool, welcome reprieve, although tonight she was reluctant to leave them not just because they soothed her sore ass, but because it felt so good to lie down. Eesh, this place was zapping her strength, not that Raven wanted to admit this. Eeth had said it was doing the same to him, after all. Thus, five minutes later, the padawan had cleaned herself up and emerged from her bedroom, just in time to see a droid delivering their sandwiches. Her stomach turned at the thought, although the spiced water with leaves floating in it looked delicious!

Eeth was not particularly hungry himself but he knew that they needed more to sustain them than the bowl of soup they had had for lunch. Thus, he poured both of them a large jug of spiced water and served himself to a sandwich with smoked fish.

"Padawan, we are not having another discussion about whether you want to eat or not," he said, seeing the unenthusiastic look on Raven's face and interpreting it correctly. "You will eat at least one sandwich before I provide healing."

"I wasn't going to complain," she lied and lowered herself into a seat opposite. Raven took a sandwich and started eating, as much as it made her feel like she was going to be sick. Eventually, after having eaten only one half of her meal, she met Eeth with a weary expression. "Master?" she asked, gaining his attention. "I really don't feel well. If this is the heat and how the planet is, then I think it hates me. And I promise I'm not saying this because my ass hurts and I'm begging for you to heal me early. Although I won't say no to that ."

Eeth frowned and gave her a scrutinising look. He could sense no deception in her. She really seemed to feel unwell. He rose and rested his hand on her forehead.

"You might be running a slight fever," he said. "And your energy levels are rather low. Drink another glass of water and go to bed. I will perform some healing and then you should sleep."

He hoped that this was nothing serious; maybe it was just due to the tropical heat or something Raven had eaten. The thought briefly occurred to him that it might be related to his own latent fatigue and heat flashes but he suppressed that though. He had no time to be sick, at least not before the conference had ended tomorrow. And Raven would surely be alright after a good night's sleep.

That Raven didn't protest or argue this was all-telling. She rose, downed another glass of water, gave a slight bow and made for her bedroom. Such a relief was it to finally lie down that she didn't even bother getting under the covers, she just face-planted and closed her eyes.

Eeth sat on the edge of the bed next to Raven, gently bared her bottom and applied some healing energy to it. He found it a tad difficult to focus but it was manageable. Both of them were probably just really tired.

Raven didn't get a chance to thank him for his efforts, as before he had finished, she was out like a light.

* * *

Nothing was better the next morning. In fact, Raven was feeling a damned sight worse. Her mouth was drier than a sand hut on Tattooine, her body was aching and she was hot and cold at the same time. She was just about to go find Eeth when he entered, flicking on her light as was their morning ritual. The padawan stumbled to her feet, both hands cupping either side of her head as if the action would somehow stop her brain from splitting her skull. "I don't feel…" Raven didn't get to finish that sentence before she swayed. Suddenly, the floor started getting closer and she blacked out.

Fortunately for Raven, Eeth was fast and he caught her before she hit the ground. He lifted her back onto the bed, laid her down and sat next to her. Frowning, he rested a hand onto her forehead. Her fever was rising fast. From what he sensed through the Force, he assumed that a virus was active in her body. Eeth just hoped that it was not something Raven had caught from the Neimoidians. They were known carriers of horrible diseases, which were usually highly infectious. Eeth also hoped that he himself had not caught whatever was plaguing Raven but since there was nothing he could do about it if that had happened, he pushed the thought aside for the moment. There was no telling what it was, anyway, and to what extent it befell Zabrak, if at all.

He was no trained healer and did not have the equipment to run a complete diagnosis on Raven. Thus, he decided to do what he could to make her feel better and return her to the Temple as fast as possible. He gave her a hypospray that ought to reduce the fever to non-dangerous levels and covered her with a blanket. Then he went to the terminal and notified the Temple that his padawan had fallen ill and that he needed a fast, piloted ship to stand by as soon as possible. He would try to mediate the conclusion of the conference, but the possibility that Raven's disease would require immediate transport to a medical facility could not be excluded.

The last item on the agenda was to ensure that he did not fall ill himself, or at least not before they had reached the Temple. There was still about an hour left before he absolutely had to get ready for the conference if he wanted to make it in time. Thus, he drank a glass of water, returned to Raven's room, sat cross-legged on the floor and entered a healing trance.


	6. Chapter 6

A/N: Hey, all. Firstly, thank you to everyone who has taken the time to leave us a review, it's very much appreciated. A special shout out to MallieexxPotter and Ullswater for your wonderfully detailed and insightful reviews. We love to hear your speculation on plot direction and your thoughts on how the story is progressing. At this point, we are over halfway through, yet there is still quite a lot of 'excitement' left to come. Life is never dull for our Jedi, as much as they wish we would cut them some slack sometimes!

* * *

One hour later, Raven was still out like a light. She did not seem to be in any acute danger, though. Thus, Eeth took a shower and got dressed. He was not hungry at all but forced himself to eat a piece of fruit, at least.

He had just finished when the comm unit beeped. He went to take the call.

"Master Koth," the delegate of the Republican Senate, a Malastarian Gran, said, appearing to be quite flustered. "It seems as if a disease is spreading rapidly throughout the resort. My human co-delegate has been struck. I have met members of two other delegations at breakfast and found that at least four more people are ill, all humanoids."

"Thank you for notifying me," Eeth replied. "It seems as if my padawan has been infected, too. Very well. I will call all delegations and find out how many more delegates are affected. Depending on the result, we might have to cancel or postpone the remainder of the conference."

He sent an inquiry to all delegations and received answers in the course of the next ten minutes. It turned out that about half the members of the delegations had been struck by the disease, including the entire Trade Federation delegation which suggested a Neimoidian origin to the virus. There was no point in continuing the proceedings under the circumstances. Eeth asked the hotel management to inform all guests of the epidemic and execute quarantine procedures. He then drafted a proposal that would allow the delegations to finalise their decisions through a comm conference later that month. There were not many issues left to discuss anyway. Finally, he arranged for a speeder to take them to the spaceport in twenty minutes so they could board the ship that had been dispatched by the Temple.

When all that had been accomplished, he returned to Raven's room. His own bag was already sitting by the door and he now packed Raven's quietly. Then, he gently shook her awake.

"Padawan?" he said softly. "We are leaving. We need to get to the spaceport soon. I have already packed your things. How are you feeling?"

"Thirsty. And I really need to pee," replied Raven. She sounded as pitiful as she looked which was really saying something.

"Alright," said Eeth. "I am going to help you to the refresher. Come on."

Raven didn't protest and simply raised her arms because she couldn't get to the refresher on her own now if her life depended on it.

Eeth hoisted her up below the armpits and lifted her onto his hip, carrying her into the refresher. As this was a luxurious hotel, it was a rather large room and it was no problem for Eeth to deposit Raven in front of the toilet without smashing into anything.

"Are you able to stand?" he asked. "Will you be alright if I leave you for a moment to fetch a glass of water?"

"Yes," Raven replied weakly, placing a hand on the wall to steady herself. She managed to get her underpants down and sat on the toilet, and that was where she stayed; Raven simply didn't have the strength to do more than this. And as if that weren't bad enough, she was starting to feel nauseous.

Eeth produced a roll of tabs from his medical kit that had rehydrating qualities. He dissolved one of them in a glass of water and added a pinch of sugar. He also prepared another hypospray that might help with the weakness and fever – if the virus was responsive to it, which remained to be seen. He placed the glass and hypospray on Raven's bedside table and continued to the refresher. Recognising her state, and without batting an eyelid, he wiped Raven clean, pulled up her pants and carried her back to her bed.

"I brought you something to drink," he said softly, handing her the glass. "And I will give you another hypospray to help with the fatigue and fever. Then we will return to the Temple so the healers can look after you. You will be fine, padawan."

Raven accepted the glass of water gratefully and downed it. She honestly didn't have the energy to do much else. "Thank you, master," she said, the water somehow driving the nausea down with it. "Do you know what's wrong with me?" Whatever it was was serious and it was scaring her, even if she was trying to make out that it wasn't.

"Not exactly," said Eeth. "A virus, certainly; possibly one of Neimoidian origin. I have no way to diagnose or cure it, but I can alleviate the symptoms. A ship is already standing by to take us back to the Temple. We will be with the healers in three hours or so. They will be able to tell us more."

He pressed the hypospray to the base of her neck and applied it quickly. His head was pounding but he had no time for that. He drew a deep breath and centred on the Force.

"We're going back to the Temple?" Raven tried to push herself up onto her elbows to get a better look at what he was doing, only to fail and slump down again. "I know I wasn't exactly enthusiastic about this mission and all, but neither do I want to be responsible for leaving it incomplete." Raven was trying to be brave about this and put their mission first.

"Padawan," Eeth said gently, "an illness is something you cannot control. And yours seems to be quite serious. If it makes you feel better, you are not the only reason we are leaving. Half the delegates fell ill, including the entire Neimoidian delegation which probably introduced all of them to this virus. There was no point in continuing, and besides, the hotel needs to impose quarantine measures. Now, I have a droid waiting at the door to carry our bags to the speeder. I will carry you."

Okay, so it didn't sound so bad when he put it like that, not that Raven had it in her to protest at the moment. She wrinkled her nose at the prospect of being carried, yet again, there was nothing she could do about it. Making it to their ship on her own steam was not going to happen. Therefore, as Eeth swaddled her into a blanket and made to lift her up, Raven did her best to curl herself into him in an effort at making this easier, not that her weight was any problem for Eeth. It was more the principle of the thing. The second he lifted her, though, the nausea returned from earlier with a vengeance and she cupped a hand over her mouth; throwing up on Eeth was just not going to happen.

Eeth sent her a surge of soothing energy through the Force that helped quell the nausea. It was difficult, though; his access to the Force was muted somehow. It seemed as if the virus did, in fact, befall Zabrak. But then, they were, as a rule, more resilient than humans. If he was lucky, he would not nearly be as badly affected as Raven.

Grateful for whatever Eeth had done to quash the nausea, Raven closed her eyes and did her best to keep still.

She had no idea how long she had slept but the next time her eyes opened, it was to the sight of a dark room inside what could only be their spaceship back to the Temple. Her throat was dry and her head pounded but so far she wasn't nauseous. Spotting Eeth seated on a mat opposite her bunk meditating, Raven tried to sit up. Yeah, that was a bad idea and before she could so much as get a hand to her mouth, she had thrown up. "Ug-yuckkkk!" the padawan cried. She hated to throw up, hated it!

Eeth shrank up from the meditative trance he had entered as soon as they had reached the ship. By that time, he had been drenched in sweat and certain that the virus was active in him as well, so meditation had seemed like his best option. He rose a lot less gracefully than he usually did, stumbling slightly, and pressed a button to call a cleaning droid.

"You will be alright, padawan," he said in a slightly hoarse voice as he took a towel from a cupboard and went to moisten it.

He filled a cup of water, too, and brought it to Raven. "We are nearly at the Temple," he said soothingly as he handed her the cup and sat down in one of the few spots that were not vomit-splattered to wipe her forehead.

Raven might have been a hot mess, quite literally, yet she wasn't so far gone that she failed to notice Eeth's condition. He was sweaty and looked pale. "Master," she said, her voice higher pitched than his but carrying the same rasp to it. "You're sick also?" Force, had she passed this on to him?

"I seem to be," Eeth said, forcing a slight smile, as the door opened and a beeping cleaning droid rolled in. "Do not worry on my account. Zabrak are resilient. Just focus on getting better. Are you up to getting up for a moment? I called a cleaning droid to clean up the vomit and change the bedsheets. I would rather not do it myself right now, and the pilot is not allowed to come close to us. We are under quarantine."

Of course she was going to worry on his account, and her expression said as much. That said, Eeth was right; there wasn't a lot either of them could do other than try to make this as painless as they could on each other. It was with that thought in mind that the padawan blew out a sigh and nodded. As if sitting in vomit-slathered sheets weren't incentive enough to move, the urge to pee had hit her once again. "I gotta go. Again." Raven gestured to the refresher and gave him an apologetic expression.

Eeth drew a deep breath and nodded. Motioning for the beeping cleaning droid to give them a little space, he rose and helped Raven up, resisting the wobbly feeling in his legs. By the time he had helped her into the refresher, he was drenched in sweat and it took him enormous willpower to remain standing. Fortunately for both of them, he _did_ possess enormous willpower and it was only because of that fact that he managed to get Raven back into her bed, which the droid had cleaned up in the meanwhile.

"Sleep, padawan," he croaked and collapsed onto his own bunk.

Had Raven possessed an ounce of strength herself, she would have tried to help, yet there was honestly nothing she could do; if Eeth hadn't carried her, she would have simply wet her pants. Thankfully for both of them, this wasn't a problem for now. In fact, Raven was out for the count again the moment Eeth put her on the bunk. The fever was under control thanks to hyposprays, but she was thirsty and sore all over.

When they finally arrived at the Temple, Raven did not object at being carried to a stretcher. She did, however, watch as a couple of healers dressed in what looked like spacesuits did the same for Eeth. That he was not protesting this treatment – in fact, he was not moving at all, let alone speaking – was all-telling. "Is he going to be okay?" she asked, worried and not bothering to hide the concern in her tone. The young healer standing over Raven put a finger to her mask in the universal gesture for silence just as another healer approached with some sort of face mask. It had what looked like smoke coming out of the holes and was attached to a bottle via thin tubing. Raven looked at it, looked at the man holding it over her mouth, and then the lights went out again.

* * *

The next time her eyes opened, Raven was in a sealed room, only a thin medical curtain separating her bed from Eeth's. She pulled the mask from her face, ignoring the furry sensation on her tongue. "Master, are you alright?"

"I'm afraid I have caught the same virus as you have," Eeth murmured tiredly. He felt hot and cold, exhausted and nauseous and his head was practically bursting. He could only hope the healers would be able to do something about any of this because so far, they had not. They had taken blood samples from both of them and left with the promise to be back shortly. True to their word, just after Eeth had uttered his reply, a young Mon Calamarian healers' apprentice entered, introducing himself as Anskar. He opened the curtain between both beds at Eeth's request, provided them with a jug of water and a cup each, and checked their temperatures. He frowned when he read Raven's. His frown deepened when he read Eeth's. He pressed a call button, and twenty seconds later a middle-aged human woman with an air of purpose entered the room, followed by a dark-skinned human man.

"Good morning," she said in a businesslike manner. "I am Healer Sopan, head of the disease department. We are still analysing the virus you have caught. So far, we have been able to exclude brain rot and the intestinal plague, which are the deadliest diseases commonly carried by Neimoidians, so you have a good chance to survive this. I am sorry if that doesn't sound trust-inspiring, but diseases transmitted by Neimoidians are rarely harmless. I and my colleague Nadeem will perform some Force-aided healing on both of you in order to help your systems fight the virus, and we will give you a medication that will boost your immune system. There's little else we can do before the test results are in, which may take between an hour and half a day depending on the nature of the virus. I would prefer not to lower your fever unless it's absolutely necessary because it helps create an environment in which the virus cannot thrive. I will give you medication for the pain and the nausea, though. Do you have any questions so far?"

Eeth just shook his head very slightly, flinching at the pain this caused. His lips felt too dry and his tongue too swollen to speak and he could hardly keep his eyes open. He did not even have the energy left to pretend to act in a masterly fashion, and that was saying something.

Raven was on the jug of water immediately and had downed a glass by the time Sopan had finished explaining. Eeth's failure to respond verbally drew the padawan's attention. He looked terrible and seemed to be getting worse as she watched him, if such a thing were possible. The fact that he was showing signs of pain worried her all the more; Eeth rarely showed discomfort so he must be in a serious state. Nadeem was helping him drink and had poured her another glass, too, which Raven accepted gratefully. By this stage the padawan knew that getting up, fast movements or even loud noise would cause an onset of symptoms and so she remained as still as possible.

"Healer Sopan," Raven said, getting the woman's attention. "Whatever this disease is, it makes you nauseous, causes a high fever, fatigue, lack of appetite and…" – as if to frame this last point Eeth started drinking from the cup held by Nedeem – "makes you thirsty all the time. If you try to move too fast, it makes you feel like you've been hit by an airbus," the padawan added, hoping this information would help in some way. Raven allowed her head to slump back into the pillow. She was scared for her master, hell, she was scared for herself.

"Thank you, Padawan Trebeck," said Healer Sopan. "We hope to identify it soon. Now please lie back and rest. We are taking care of both of you."

Eeth's fever was so high now that he was barely aware of his surroundings; but thirsty he was. He gulped down the cup of water that Healer Nadeem presented him with and asked for more in a throaty murmur. Healer Sopan frowned. She had a brief conversation with Healer Nadeem, and a short while later they started attaching both master and padawan to various tubes that rehydrated their bodies and prevented them from having to use the refresher which would have been a major ordeal in their state.

Okay, so getting an IV was one thing, thought Raven, but a catheter? Force, no! Raven did absolutely not want one of those, yet neither could she get out of bed without being carried. It was a catch twenty-two! Besides, the padawan did not possess the strength to fight them off, even if she had been brave enough to try such a thing on with a healer. Subsequently, Raven lay still and rigid, the arm with the IV line straight and the other crossed over her chest; it was the best she could do given she did not have the energy for more of a protest.

Sopan noticed that Raven, while very weak, was currently better off than Eeth. That might be due to the hyposprays he had given her, or the disease might hit Zabrak worse than humans, or - if they were very lucky - the worst might already be behind her. That would remain to be seen. "Is there anyone you wish to be notified?" Sopan asked Raven who was the only one of the two who was entirely conscious.

"Knight Lakhri Tumuel," Raven replied, pausing for a moment to clear her throat so she could recite his comm code and quarters location.

Eeth still looked dreadful. In fact, he was whiter than she was and that was certainly saying something for a Zabrak. Closing her eyes, the padawan did her best to tap into their bond, trying desperately to find him amidst the fever-induced confusion. It was frightening. Raven was not accustomed to feeling Eeth so depleted. She wanted to help, or at the very least to let him know that she was here and to send him some of her strength.

Sopan noticed quickly what she was doing and was not pleased. "Stop this nonsense," she said sternly. "You are sick yourself and need your strength. You are only making yourself worse. We are taking good care of your master. He is not dying. Now, do yourself a favour and just REST."

"Sorry. I just wanted to help. He's a lot worse than I am," Raven explained.

"He is," said Sopan, somewhat more kindly. "Which is why he needs the help of a professional healer. If you want to do him a favour, be mindful of your own health. That way, when he regains consciousness, he won't have to worry about you and will be able to focus on getting better himself. As soon as you're well enough, we'll allow you to look after him all you like. But for today, all you need to do is rest. No Force work."

"Alright," Raven conceded and tried to relax. It wasn't particularly hard as, despite being in better shape than Eeth, she still felt like death warmed up.

* * *

It could have been minutes, hours or days for all Raven knew, but the next time she opened her eyes Eeth was still passed out, a tall pitcher of water remained untouched at his side. Raven had not known it was possible to fit that many tubes into one man but they had managed, and boy, did it look uncomfortable! Groaning, she tried to sit up and was pleasantly surprised to find her head did not threaten to split open in the process. That was as far as she dared to push herself, though. This virus had completely totalled her, and the last thing she wanted to do was start vomiting again. Raven hated vomiting.

Less than a minute after Raven had woken up, Sopan entered. Since they were dealing with a serious and unknown disease here, the room was permanently monitored. Anskar had notified her immediately when Raven had stirred and opened her eyes.

"Good afternoon," said Sopan. "How are you feeling?"

"I'm not brave enough to attempt more movement in order to find out," replied Raven honestly. "Better, I think. How is my master?" Raven looked over at Eeth who was still unconscious.

Sopan did not reply immediately but her forehead creased slightly, almost imperceptibly with worry as she glanced at Eeth's still form.

"I will tell you in a moment," she finally said. "Knight Lakhri is currently getting dressed in a quarantine suit. He will be with us shortly."

Right on cue, Lakhri entered the room. Like the healers, he was wearing a mask and white overalls. He threw a worried look at Eeth but, deciding that there was nothing he could do for the man, crossed over to Raven's bed. "Hiya," he said, climbing onto its edge and putting a friendly hand on the girl's shoulder. "Turns out the mission wasn't all that boring, huh?"

"Lakhri!" Raven said, looking relieved despite how bad her voice sounded. She hugged him close, all the while being mindful not to move too quickly, lest she start spinning. Raven was doing everything she could to avoid throwing up again.

Lakhri returned the hug readily, glancing at Sopan who looked as if she wanted to talk to them.

"Alright," said Sopan in her usual fast and efficient manner, "here is what I can tell you at this point. We have identified the disease. It's a rare virus that is highly contagious and affects most humanoid species, but is hardly ever fatal and usually runs its course quickly, as it is doing with you. However, it leaves infected persons drained of energy for weeks; you will probably feel much better by tomorrow, but need to take it easy and rest a lot for several more weeks. Your master, unfortunately, has been struck with a mutant of the virus that causes much more severe symptoms. Neimoidians are good at producing and spreading mutants, and this seems to be exactly what happened in this case. There is no way of knowing what the outcome will be. Our specialists are trying to produce a cure, but it's a very complex virus and creating a cure will take time. We have determined that you will be immune to the variant that your master carries, but other humanoids coming in contact with either of you will be certain to be infected. Therefore, no one will be allowed to enter this room without a protective suit."

"A mutant variant?" Raven was horrified. Eeth looked truly terrible and there was nothing she could do to help him, nothing! Not even get out of bed and offer a little comfort. Not even to let him know she was here! "Uh, Master Sopan. If Eeth has a mutant variant, does that mean that I didn't infect him, that he didn't catch the virus while having to care for me?" Raven wanted to clarify.

"It does," said Sopan. "He must have caught it from one of the Neimoidians, probably a little after you were infected. Which was lucky because it enabled him to get the two of you out of there before he fell seriously ill."

Lakhri squeezed Raven's shoulder affectionately, throwing another worried look at Eeth.

Despite the relief hearing that she was not responsible for infecting Eeth provided, Raven didn't like what Sopan had told them. His symptoms were much worse, and they didn't have a cure. Those two statements tumbled around in her thoughts for a long moment until tears began welling in her eyes. Raven choked down the lump in her throat, clenching her jaw tightly in an effort to keep from crying. She was Eeth's padawan, though, and wasn't about to fall apart at the seams, at least not yet. "Can he die from the symptoms before it runs its course?" Raven asked, because, well, that had been on her mind also.

"I'm afraid that there's no way to tell right now," said Sopan, moving to sit beside Eeth and establish a healing link with him.

"You know how strong he is," said Lakhri soothingly. "And he's in the best care the galaxy has to offer. I'm sure the healers will pull him through."

Raven nodded and fell silent, the lump in her throat having expanded to choking levels now; if she spoke, she was going to come unstuck.

"For now, just make sure you get better soon so you can look after him, alright?" said Lakhri softly.

"She may look after him when and only when she's been cleared to do so," Healer Sopan remarked without looking up from where she was monitoring Eeth's condition through the Force. "If she's sensible, this should not take longer than one or two days."

"Well, looks as if you'll have to be a good girl, then," Lakhri said with a chuckle.

"I'm always good, you know that," Raven replied bravely. She remained silent, simply observing the healer until the woman eventually left the room, clicking something off on her pager. Raven leaned into Lakhri's side and started sniffling into his coveralls, finally allowing the dam to break. All her pent-up emotions came out in one big wave, her sniffling turning into heartfelt sobs. Eeth could die from this, and she was powerless to do anything about it; it was truly terrifying.

Lakhri hugged her quietly, rocking her slightly. He could guess how she was feeling because he was quite terrified himself. There was nothing he could think to say that might reassure her; he simply allowed her to cry herself out. Eventually, her sobs quieted down and her eyelids drooped. Once she was asleep, Lakhri covered her with the blanket, notified the healers and left to organise their luggage in their quarters.

* * *

The next time Raven opened her eyes, Lakhri was not in her line of sight. Someone must have slid her bunk closer to Eeth's, though, as she could now reach him without having to get up or exert too much energy. Not that she could get up, of course. Raven squinted and raised her hand to block some intrusion; she had not noticed a healer was in the room until a small, focussed light shone in her eyes. "Argh! Enough," the padawan snapped, recoiling from the light. It hurt her eyes but that wasn't her concern now as the fast movements had her fumbling for the bedpan. The healer was by her side immediately, pulling her hair back into a loose ponytail and holding a cool cloth to her forehead but as she dry-heaved for the last time that session, the padawan did not possess the energy to thank him. Two minutes later, she felt a hypospray being placed at the base of her neck and the lights were out again.

* * *

Raven had no idea how long she had slept this time but judging from healers she could see walking past, it had been at least long enough for another shift. Tentatively, she opened one eye, careful to brace herself for the wave of nausea this had caused last time, and was grateful when none came. Lakhri was sitting in a chair at the end of their beds, his eyes closed. "I – is," she tried, only to stop and, much to her disgust, proceeded to hack up a rainbow of phlegm into the pan. Lakhri moved over to Raven and supported her while she coughed. When she was finished, he removed the pan, slid a big pillow behind her back and sat down on the edge of her bed.

"He still looks like a cooling unit. He's no better, is he?" Raven finally managed to ask. Her chest felt lighter, and her throat was no longer sore. Still, the stuff coming out of her was almost enough to make her hurl without the nausea.

"He's definitely no better, and he might even be worse," Lakhri said quietly. "The healers have been experimenting with cures, but none of them were particularly successful. What they have been able to find, however, was alarming because it suggested that the disease was not the result of an accidental mutation, but was designed – specifically designed to befall Zabrak. And Eeth was the only Zabrak at the conference."

"Wait. What? They targeted Eeth specifically?" Raven repeated in disbelief, her ire piqued at the sheer audacity of these Neimoidians.

"Probably they weren't interested in Eeth specifically," Lakhri replied. "More in Jedi mediation in general. Eeth was just unlucky to be in charge of it this time. They're cowards, and they're particularly afraid of the Jedi. I assume they wanted to get rid of the Jedi mediator so they could somehow trick the other delegates, or even get them to do without Jedi mediators altogether in the future. Apparently, their plan backfired because so many delegates, including themselves contracted the normal variant of the virus. Maybe they had intended for a few of them to be infected in order to make Eeth's illness look less suspicious. Anyway, the healers have informed the Council of this, which is why Mace Windu is currently visiting the Trade Federation's Embassy on Coruscant to have a little chat with them."

Raven was controlling her emotions rather well, considering how sick she was. Or, perhaps it was _because_ she was so sick and lacked the energy for the volatile response hearing of this attempt on Eeth's life warranted. That didn't mean she wasn't seething on the inside; she totally was. "Do you think Mace will get anything out of them? I mean, they're a nasty bunch. Eeth and I sensed corruption and treachery from the outset."

"Judging from the expression on his face when he left, they are not to be envied," said Lakhri. "Our main hope is that he will get them to provide some information about this virus that will help the healers. The healers have been analysing the virus around the clock, but it is so complex that it might take them months to design a cure unless Master Windu procures information. So that's what we're all waiting for. In the meanwhile, the healers have been able to stabilise Eeth's condition, but not to actually heal him. They have also not managed to bring the fever down."

"What do you mean they can't bring the fever down?" Raven exclaimed, her tone fearful. "Lakhri, what if his brain fries because of this?" It was a fear she had yet had to express due to the fact that Raven herself had not wanted to voice such a possibility. Speaking it aloud meant that someone had to comment on the likelihood, and Raven wasn't sure she was ready to hear that.

"Well, the healers are doing their damnedest to avoid that," Lakhri said quietly, fully aware that this was an evasive answer. He knew that the healers were worried, which worried him, too.

He put an arm around Raven's shoulder in a valiant effort at distraction. "But at least you look better," he said truthfully.

"I –," Raven shook her head. "I can't believe they would go to such lengths over some stupid communication frequencies," the latter said more to herself than Lakhri. She leant into his side, grateful for the comfort and his company.

At this point, Healer Nadeem entered the room, smiling at the two of them.

"Padawan Raven," he said in greeting. "You're looking much better. And I'm glad to inform you that there's good news. I've just received notice that Master Windu has apparently… well…"

"Kicked some Neimoidian ass?" Lakhri supplied hopefully.

Raven, too, dared to hope because if they had found something out, there was a chance for Eeth!

Nadeem grinned. "That would be one way to put it, yes," he said. "He has more or less forced them to give him a file containing details on the makeup of the virus. Our specialists have already started analysing it and trying to work out a fast way to produce a cure. I hope that we will know more later today."

"Master Windu is the best!" Raven exclaimed. There was hope now!

Nadeem went to Eeth's bed, rested a hand on the man's forehead, scanned him through the Force and frowned but did not speak. Then he crossed over to Raven, repeated the same with her and smiled.

"Well, the worst is over," he said. "If you manage to stay in bed for one more day and do what we tell you, you might be allowed up tomorrow. It would also mean you could get rid of the catheter. As soon as you manage to eat without heaving, we can relieve you of the IV line as well. Give it one or two more days, and you will be without tubes attached to any part of your body."

"That would be awesome. I hate being like this," Raven replied, flicking at the IV in her arm. She felt powerless, not just because of her own situation but also for Eeth. Everything rested with the healers now. The padawan reached for Eeth, taking his hand in hers. She knew if he were awake this would make him terribly uncomfortable but given his comatose state, she simply hoped it would provide him with some comfort.

Eeth stirred slightly, and an unconscious smile graced his features for a moment.

Lakhri had to grin at the sight. "I've always said he had a weak spot for you," he told Raven. "I bet he took you to the beach before the conference even started. Did he?"

Eeth's smile meant more to Raven than any amount of words spoken by healers, and she gave his hand a gentle squeeze in response before turning her smile on Lakhri. "He did. We raced, too, and I nearly beat him. Well, kinda." Raven sighed at being reminded of how much he had deteriorated thanks to this virus. "He's so strong, you know," Raven said, more to herself than anyone else.

"He is," said Lakhri softly, cuddling Raven close as they both looked wistfully at Eeth's pale and drawn face.

* * *

The healers spent most of the night working to keep Eeth's fever down, with limited success. Raven begged to help but had been told in no uncertain terms that the only way she could help was to keep out of the way and get some rest. Raven hated to admit it, but they were right. Even if she could get up right now, there wasn't anything for her to help with; the healers had this covered. Resigned, Raven closed her eyes and tried to sleep. It wasn't hard, and the next thing she knew, it was morning. The first thing she noticed was that the light no longer hurt her eyes. The virus had subsided, which lead to her next thought: was standing up on the cards?

"Fuckitandshit!" she hissed as her knees gave out beneath her, and she barely managed to catch herself by gripping Eeth's bed rail. "Nope, too soon, too soon!" she said, sounding like a crazy person while clawing her way back into her bunk. Great, now she was nauseous again.

Right at that moment, Lakhri entered, emerging from the refresher with damp hair and a towel around his waist. While Raven had been sleeping, the healers had managed to produce a vaccine against the virus and had given him a shot, which had eliminated the need for a protective suit. They also thought they had made headway in finding a cure and were currently testing a medication on Eeth that had seemed to improve his energy patterns and most of his metabolic readings. The one thing that refused to go down as yet, however, was his fever, and Lakhri sensed that the healers were becoming worried because of that. Healer Sopan and Healer Nadeem had just left for a conference in the lab; he could only hope that they were going to come up with a solution.

Eeth's condition aside, Lakhri was decidedly unhappy to find Raven on her feet, or rather, slumped down on the floor, suspended on Eeth's bed rail.

"What are you doing there?" he snapped. Grabbing Raven under her armpits, he hoisted her back onto her bed. "Are you crazy?" he demanded, hands on hips. "What, exactly, did you want to prove, and to whom?"

"I'm sorry, Lakhri. That was stupid," Raven admitted as he sat her on the bed. "I just wanted to see if I could stand because I felt better. I couldn't." She dropped her now pounding head into both palms as if the action might stop her head from splitting, and held her breath to keep from throwing up.

"Lie back down," said Lakhri sternly. "You'll try to stand when the healers give you permission and not before. Is that clear?"

"Yes, Lakhri. Clear," came the quiet reply as she lay back on the pillows; speaking too loudly might just tip her over the edge, and there was no way she wanted to throw up. It took her a moment to risk opening her eyes again, but when she did, she noticed that Lakhri was not clad in his white overalls. "How come you're not wearing your spacesuit? And did they make any progress in finding a cure for Eeth?"

"I am without my suit because the healers have developed a vaccine," said Lakhri in a gentler tone of voice. "They are still working on a cure, though. They have been successful with some of the symptoms, but not the fever." He could not quite keep the worry out of his facial expression as he looked at Eeth.

The vaccine was good news, although the look on his face had not gone unnoticed, and it worried Raven. She met his gaze with a troubled expression. "Do you think he will be ok? I mean he's just so hot. I honestly don't know how much more of this he can take before it starts doing serious damage, even for a Zabrak." Raven put a hand on Eeth's forehead, gently swiping back a strand of sweaty hair. He would hate being unkempt, she knew. That said, Eeth had bigger problems right now.

Lakhri sighed. "Yeah, that's what the healers are worried about," he admitted. "It's just not as if any of us can do anything about it. And I know how frustrating that is, but there you go. Now do you think I can get dressed without you getting into any further mischief?"

Raven sighed, too. That was not what she wanted to hear, but at least he was being truthful. She looked left and then right as if to quip "Where else would I be?", and said, "I'll be here."

While Lakhri was dressing, Healer Apprentice Anskar entered and administered an antiemetic, helping to alleviate the nausea her effort to stand had caused.

"Thanks. Hey, when do you think I can be rid of some of these tubes?" she inquired.

"Well, I'd have to ask–" Anskar started, but at that moment, the door opened and Healer Sopan marched inside, a determined look on her face. She was followed by a host of other healers.

"Anskar, I need you to look after the other wards for a while," she said. "We'll be busy here until further notice."

Anskar nodded. "I'm afraid you'll have to wait," he told Raven kindly. "Your master is in a critical state and he needs all their attention right now."

As Lakhri emerged from the refresher, fully dressed, he found the room full of healers, all of whom seemed tremendously busy. Two fully trained healers established a healing bond with Eeth simultaneously while two apprentices piled ice packs around him. Four healers in white coats had brought their lab equipment and kept handing Healer Sopan hyposprays which she administered. Every time she did so, she checked for Eeth's response. Apparently, the result was never to her satisfaction because she would then rap out orders like "Increase the adaptation rate" or "Try a less acidic variant" or "Drop the 3HDAD chain and decrease the output of viral DNA."

Raven watched on quietly as the healers worked. She was worried about Eeth, but again, there was nothing she could do for him other than to keep out of their way, and the same was true for Lakhri.

As one hour passed and then two, it became increasingly clear that this was not going to be an easy process. Sopan had to think now before giving new instructions and a crease was marring her brow.

At some point, Lakhri's comlink beeped. He checked and rose.

"Can I leave you for a couple of hours?" he asked Raven. "The healers are right here, after all. They couldn't find a replacement for a class I'm teaching and I'd rather not cancel it unless you absolutely need me to stay."

"Yes, go teach your class. I'll message for you if anything happens with Eeth." Raven leant over, slowly as not to bring on any nausea, and hugged him. "Thanks for being here for us," she said, and Raven really meant that. Having Lakhri here had made this horrific situation endurable.

"Hey, of course I am," said Lakhri, returning the hug. "Try to get some more sleep while I'm gone, okay?" He gave her a smile and left with a last, worried look at Eeth and the healers surrounding him.


	7. Chapter 7

The healers worked tirelessly for hours. Lakhri returned and sat on Raven's bed. They were not talking much, focussed on watching the healers with increasing concern. By late afternoon, Healer Sopan was pale and had dark circles around her eyes, but from the determined set of her jaw, it was clear that she refused to give up. Then, suddenly, upon the injection of the sixty-second hypospray, one of the two healers maintaining a link with Eeth started to smile and the other one whooped. Healer Sopan took hold of Eeth's wrist, closed her eyes and checked on him herself.

"I think we might have got it," she said in a voice that was slightly hoarse from rapping out orders. "The infection is receding, and his temperature is dropping. Produce more of that variant. And take away the ice bags. Shinden and Arkan," she told the two healers sitting next to Eeth's head, "take a break. Let's see how he is faring on the medication. Oh, and could one of you look after Padawan Raven? I'm afraid she's had to wait rather long." She continued to work while she spoke, checking readouts and adjusting settings.

Lakhri was giddy with relief. He hugged Raven tightly and discovered, to his surprise, that there were tears in his eyes.

Raven, too, was beyond thrilled at this eventuality. For the longest time, the padawan had watched Eeth's chest rise and fall from her bed as healers continued to poke and prod at him. She felt helpless and was honest to the Force terrified that at any moment, the virus might win out, and she would lose her master. That they had made some progress, that his fever was receding, was welcome news to say the least. Raven returned Lakhri's hug with as much enthusiasm as she could muster given her current condition.

Shinden and Arkan stood up and stretched. After a brief exchange of words, the younger one of the two, Shinden, left while Arkan, a turquoise Twi'lek, moved over to Raven.

"Hiya," he said, giving her a friendly smile. "Sorry you had to wait it out. Your master was in a critical situation, but I think he's on the mend now. How are you feeling? Nauseous? Achy? Stronger than before or just the same?"

"I feel so much better knowing that they might have found something that works for my master!" Raven replied, still on a high from the good news.

"Yes, that's understandable," said Arkan with a small smile, "but it's not what I asked. How are you feeling physically?"

"Physically I'm okay, I guess, just as long as I don't try moving too fast or standing up. I haven't tried either of those since before Lakhri left, but that was hours ago. In comparison to how I felt yesterday, though, it's an improvement," she told him.

Healer Arkan nodded and sat at her side. He took her hand, closed his eyes and established a healing link. "You should wait some more before you get up," he said finally. "Your body is recovering but it's still very weak and you feel quite exhausted. Try to get some sleep. The room will become much quieter now, I hope."

Before he could stand, Raven had one more question. "How much longer before I can talk with him?" she asked, her gaze resting on Eeth.

"If you're lucky," said Arkan, "your master might be awake a few hours from now. But he'll be unlikely to be able to stay awake for long or talk much while he is. The virus has taken a huge toll on his body, you know. Now sleep. It will probably help your master if he doesn't have to worry about your health, on top of his own."

"Yes, I know how sick he is. I was here too, remember?" Raven commented drily. The last thing she wanted was to cause Eeth further grief. However, being able to tell him that she was here and still alive was hardly going to tax him unduly, or so Raven assumed.

"There is no need to take an attitude with me," said Arkan mildly. "Will you be able to fall asleep or would you prefer me to help?"

Raven gave him a 'what attitude' kinda of look but took it no further; she didn't want to piss him off, even had she possessed the energy and inclination to do so. "Yes, please. That would help," she said instead and moved around to get comfortable.

* * *

Raven awoke to the sound of cutlery chinking against a plate. Lakhri was still here. "You stayed!" she said, grinning. The man had been here almost the entire time, and Raven was truly grateful for his company. "How is Eeth, is he any better?" she asked while trying to focus her eyes.

The upper half of Eeth's bed was slightly raised and his head was resting against a pillow. He still felt very tired and weary, but Healer Sopan had taken away most of the pain and he could think straight, which was a big improvement. In fact, Healer Sopan had judged his state to be satisfactory enough to leave the three alone. Lakhri had strict instructions to call her whenever something worrying happened, but so far, there had been no need for it. Eeth had woken up half an hour after Raven had fallen asleep, had talked to Lakhri briefly, had drifted asleep again and woken up for the second time ten minutes ago.

"Master! You're alive!" Raven exclaimed, sitting bolt upright and regretting it immediately. She doggedly ignored the pounding sensation that she'd come to expect with fast movements and smiled a smile that was all teeth.

"I'm fine, padawan," Eeth said mildly, in a low and raspy voice.

Lakhri snorted at Eeth's bold statement. "He's not 'fine'," he said firmly. "He's just conscious, is all. Force! First Raven gets out of bed and collapses on the floor, then Eeth declares to be 'fine' after barely having woken from a coma. Any minute now, the two of you will decide to go and have a sparring match and the healers will have to chain you to your beds!"

"Nonsense," Eeth said, but it did not come out as sternly as he might have intended. "Healer Sopan said I will make a full recovery. That is what I meant when I said I was fine. And I thank you very much for foiling my efforts to alleviate my padawan's worries."

"For the record, I was just testing my strength," Raven added, giving Lakhri a pointed look. She turned, slowly, to face Eeth while still remaining in her bed. "You don't need to alleviate my worries. I know how sick you were, how sick you are. I have been here since we arrived, too. I wasn't able to do anything other than watch and hope that you kept breathing." Raven swiped at her eyes. She wasn't crying, at least she wasn't crying from sadness. Eeth was awake, even if only for a short time, and that was the best outcome Raven could have hoped for.

"I must admit," Eeth murmured, closing his eyes to shield them from the light, "I had not expected such a move from the Neimoidians. That was an outrageous oversight. I assume I let my conviction that they would be too cowardly to take on a Jedi blind me to their intentions. I should have been wiser than that."

"Oh, yes, beat yourself up for falling ill," Lakhri said, rolling his eyes. "It's a great failing in a Jedi master. You should be above such petty afflictions. Come on, knock it off. Be glad they did not manage to kill you."

Despite agreeing with Lakhri's comment, Raven might have used a bit more tact, and she fully expected as much to come from Eeth next, the fact that he was near to his death bed notwithstanding. Then again, Lakhri tended to get away with a lot more than she did. Still, this was one tennis match she wasn't keen on playing ball boy for, and so she did not comment.

Eeth opened his mouth to utter a stern reproach, but closed it again after a second.

"You are probably right," he finally said, "although the way in which you expressed your opinion could decidedly have been more respectful. My master used to point out that blaming oneself for everything that goes wrong is a form of arrogance. I sensed that the Neimoidians were deceitful, and so did Raven, but there was no way we could have figured out this plan. In any case, I am glad they did not manage to kill me."

He gave Raven a brief smile. "And I am even more glad that this potentially lethal variant only befell me. The virus you caught was bad enough but at least there was no risk to your life," he added. And his relief about that fact was genuine!

"Yeah. Still, I don't want to think about how close we came to losing you. I was worried, really worried."

"We both were," said Lakhri softly. "What might have happened if Mace Windu had not bullied the Neimoidians into providing us with specifics on the virus bears no thinking about."

"I know master Windu has spoken to the Neimoidians already," said Raven, "but do you think the Council will let us dig around? I mean, what if they have something bigger in mind than simply influencing these negotiations?"

"Yes, padawan," Eeth croaked. "They might. The Jedi need to keep an eye on them. But I will not be the one doing so, at least not in the foreseeable future." He sighed and closed his eyes. He would never openly admit it, but he was feeling rotten.

Raven nodded, and then she fell silent. The normal variant of the virus was plenty bad enough so she could only imagine how terrible Eeth would be feeling right now. She looked to Lakhri who had sensed as much also and sighed. Well, at least Eeth was alive, which was the best outcome they could hope for at this point; the rest was just going to take time.

Lakhri noticed how exhausted Eeth looked. He also had the impression that Raven was doing much better. Most likely, she was not going to go back to sleep any time soon, which meant she would become bored. That, he wanted to prevent, especially for Eeth's sake.

"Listen, Raven," he said, "I bet you are tired of lying around in bed in a hospital gown. Shall I ask the healers whether they'd be willing to detach you from the tubes and let me take you to the pool area of the healers' wing?"

"For sure! If you think they'll let me out of bed," Raven replied quietly so as not to annoy Eeth. Lying around idle did not generally bode well for Raven. She was a fidgety, lively personality as it was. That Raven had not immediately sprung from her bed was a testament to exactly how bad this virus was and how sick it was making her, though.

"Alright, I'll ask," said Lakhri readily and went to fetch a healer. He returned with Nadeem who checked Raven over and nodded. "I'll detach you from all tubes," he said, "provided you use a hoverchair to go to the pools. Depending on whether or not you'll be able to eat and drink, you might need intravenous fluids again later. We'll see."

Raven looked down at the canular taped to her arm and winced. Of course the padawan knew there was no needle in there, but still, it freaked her out just a bit. After checking on Eeth for one last time, Raven reluctantly got into the hoverchair. That reluctance was all for show, though, as there was no way she could have made it the entire way on her own.

Half an hour later, Raven was floating on her back, trying not to sink with each lungful of breath she exhaled. "Lakhri?" she asked, sculling over to him and gripping on to the side. "Thanks for bringing me here and getting the healers to agree. Do you think it will be okay if I crash with you while Eeth recovers?" she asked tentatively. Although Raven knew they enjoyed each other's company, she also knew that Lakhri was busy.

"If Eeth is okay with that, sure," Lakhri said, flashing her a grin. "The Council has already relieved me of most of my duties while I look after the two of you. For now, we're stuck in the healers' wing; I have no idea when the healers will release you. But I suppose it'll be well before they release Eeth. For today, we'll just have to see how we can keep you busy without exhausting you too much. The healers warned me that you would tire very quickly and that the nausea will linger for some time."

"You don't say," Raven agreed. Despite the plethora of symptoms brought on by this stupid virus, nausea had been the hardest for Raven to contend with. So far she had only thrown up three times, and she would be damned if it was going to happen a fourth; Raven hated to throw up, really hated it. Thus, she heeded the reminder and kept her movements slow, not overdoing it or trying to achieve too much. Raven looked like a little prune by the time she got out of the water. "Thanks, Lakhri. You're the best, did I ever tell you that?" she said as he swaddled her in a towel and went to get her hospital gown from the hoverchair.

Lakhri grinned. "Feel free to tell me any number of times, to make up for all the times Eeth _didn't_ tell me," he said. He wasn't serious, of course. Well, not entirely.

He helped Raven back into her hoverchair and pushed her out into the corridor.

Raven snorted, and then she grinned but said nothing more.

Eeth was asleep when they returned to their room. He didn't look any worse, which was a relief. Healer Sopan was busy checking on him. She gave them a nod and continued her work while Lakhri helped Raven back into her bed. Finally, Sopan turned to the two of them.

"The medication is doing its job," she said. "He is on the mend but it will take time. A week or two until he's allowed to leave. You, on the other hand, might be allowed to return home tomorrow or the day after tomorrow if you manage to eat regularly and if Knight Lakhri makes sure that you get a lot of rest."

"I will," Lakhri assured her. "When will she be able to return to classes, though? The new term starts the day after tomorrow."

"Let's not get hasty here," said Healer Sopan. "As long as she needs a hoverchair, we need not discuss her return to classes. Since we have no experience with this particular virus, we will just have to wait and watch the recovery process. Classwork will be possible much sooner than any kind of physical activity, I assume."

"Oh, I am sure classes will be too much for me," Raven piped up, offering all in the room a smile that was all teeth.

Lakhri exchanged an eye-roll with Sopan but they did not comment.

That physical activity would be limited was not exactly thrilling news to Raven; she would die of boredom. Then again, there was just no way any sort of physical activity was on the cards for her as long as she felt like this. Raven glanced at her sleeping master, running a hand across his sweaty forehead. "He was just so much sicker than I was, are you sure he will be okay?" Raven asked. It wasn't that she didn't trust them, it was more her own insecurities, and a want for extra reassurance on her part.

"Positive," Healer Sopan said with a brief smile. "It will simply take time. Now, concerning your own health. You should try eating something light. If you're able to keep it down, you can stay off the intravenous fluids. If not, we'll need to hook you back up. Or do you need some rest before you brave an attempt at eating?"

The very idea of food had her stomach churn. It was going to be a case of what Raven hated more here; being fed via tubing, or risking throwing up. There was silence for a long time. "Maybe some sleep would help," she finally settled on because, heck, anything was worth a try if it might lessen the chance that it was going to come right back up again. She yawned and rolled on to her side, content for now that Eeth was not going to die and neither was she.

Lakhri eyed her dubiously, guessing correctly that her sudden desire to sleep was at least partly motivated by an even stronger desire to avoid eating.

"It's alright," Healer Sopan said quietly. "Let her sleep for now. But you should insist that she eats something when she wakes up. I know she won't feel like eating for the next several days, but she needs to. Make sure she does, or if you find she can't, call a healer so we can get the nutrients inside her intravenously."

Lakhri nodded. "Alright," he said. Putting a hand on Raven's shoulder, he said softly: "Get some rest first. I'll order you some soup or whatever else you feel like when you have woken up, alright?"

"Alright," the padawan agreed. In fact, her eyelids were heavy, and she was asleep in seconds. Normally, that sort of thing never happened to Raven as she found it difficult to shut her mind off and sleep as a rule. Not today, though.

* * *

Again, Raven wasn't sure if minutes or hours had passed before she woke. "Master, are you okay?" she asked, rolling onto her side and trying to focus on the still form lying in the bed adjacent. She was feeling better. That was a welcome trend; each time she woke, the symptoms felt that bit less intense.

Eeth opened his eyes, turned his head and smiled at Raven. "I am alright, padawan," he said in a low voice. "I still feel nauseous and my head tends to ache if I move too hastily, but at least I can think straight and even meditate somewhat. It is a big improvement. How about you? Are you up to eating some soup? Lakhri had to leave for a short meeting with one of his students, but he asked me specifically to make sure you eat something when you wake up, or call a healer."

That Eeth was managing so many words at once without looking pained by the effort was enough to have Raven smiling. She made a few tentative movements herself, testing the reaction, and sighed with relief when neither head-splitting pain nor nausea threatened to wipe her out. "I'll try some soup," Raven said bravely while pouring them each a glass of water from the jug. "Are you allowed to drink with the IV still attached?" she asked, as this was something Raven honestly didn't know.

"I am, and I would actually like to, despite the IV ," Eeth replied. "Thank you, padawan."

He accepted the glass and sipped a bit of water, but had to put it down as he was hit by a bout of nausea.

Raven could sympathise, really she could. "Close your eyes and hold your breath. I found that helped," she suggested. It did feel a bit odd to be offering guidance to Eeth as it was typically the other way around. Still, this virus was horrible and if it could help him, well, she was going to offer all the tips she had at her disposal.

Eeth nodded very slightly, closing his eyes and breathing slowly and deeply. The nausea subsided. It still left him thirsty but he knew that was irrational; the IV line was providing him with sufficient hydration.

Raven left him in peace. She knew firsthand how hard it was to control the nausea once it hit. She grabbed the bedside remote and tapped in an order for some clear soup and a dry bread roll. It was about the mildest, inoffensive meal she could think of.

Well before the padawan was ready to face it, a droid trundled in carrying a small bowl sealed with a plastic lid. "Um, thanks," she offered, taking the food when the droid began to get impatient. Raven held her breath and lifted the lid. Okay, so the smell was unobtrusive. That was good for both her and Eeth's sake! Typically, this meal would have been devoured without complaint; it looked delicious, after all! Today, however… Raven was not keen.

"Padawan," Eeth said after a while without opening his eyes, "either you eat it or I call a healer. If you cannot eat it, that is fine, but you will need to take in your nutrients one way or another."

"I know," Raven replied, a touch of indignation in her tone. She did know, after all, it was just hard to do. Taking a deep breath, the padawan ditched the spoon, took a sip from the bowl and swallowed. Immediately, and before any taste, smell or whatever could assault her, she pinched her nose and held her breath. It worked! And her relief was palpable. If she managed to get the rest of this down and keep it down, she would be off the tubes.

Eeth did not interfere; in fact, he did not have the strength to do anything much and it was a relief not to have to talk. He did, however, refuse to fall asleep before Raven had finished her meal. Refraining from falling asleep was actually hard work for him at this point but it was important to him to make sure that Raven got some food inside her.

The soup went down sideways, but it went down. Raven let the bowl rest into her bed rail and fell back onto her pillow. Now it was all about keeping it down. As if on cue, a healer entered the room. He checked over Eeth briefly, noticing that the man was conscious, but resting. Then, he smiled upon seeing the empty bowl. "Nice work," he told Raven, whose eyes were closed like Eeth's although she was far from settled. He produced an antiemetic and sat by her side. "You look a little green around the edges; I'll give you something to help with that."

Raven didn't move. She did, however, sigh in relief when he gave her that antiemetic, and even more welcomed was the sleep compulsion that accompanied it. She slept solidly until the early hours of the next morning when she awoke to the feeling of something cold and wet on her lips. Was it ice? It didn't taste like ice; it was kinda salty.

"It's you again," Raven spoke quietly, recognising the healer as the same man who had given her the antiemetic earlier. "Don't you ever sleep?" she asked in a hushed voice and accepted the cup of cubes.

"I've been known to, but don't tell anyone," he whispered jovially, not wanting to disturb Eeth any more than he already had. "Master Sopan asked me to stay on as I have more experience with youngsters and junior padawans," he explained in a soothing tone as he took obs.

"What time is it?" Raven asked.

"It's almost five in the morning. Do you need to use the refresher?"

"Yeah." She gave him a pained look.

"Go on then. Take it slow, and if you feel dizzy, hit the call button," the healer said. He watched her carefully, ready to catch her if she fell, but she did not, which was another good sign. As he turned to check on Eeth, Healer Sopan entered. "I have not recorded observations for Master Koth as yet, he said."

Sopan nodded. "I will," she said. "How is Padawan Trebeck doing?"

"Much better," said the healer. "She had some soup and bread yesterday and was able to use the refresher by herself. The fever is down."

"You might be able to return home by tomorrow, then," Sopan told Raven. "Now try to get some more sleep. Healer Mathew will help you fall asleep if you need him to. Knight Tumuel will come for breakfast, but that is still several hours from now."

Raven nodded curtly at the master healer, looked over at Mathew, and then her gaze fell on Eeth. "Is he okay still?" she asked, climbing into bed.

"He's still weak but he'll make a full recovery," said Sopan quietly. "The more sleep he gets, the better for him. And the same goes for you."

"I know," Raven replied and wriggled around to get comfortable. As far as hospital beds went, this one wasn't exactly bad. With Mathew's sleep compulsion, the padawan was out like a light and slept well into the late morning. When she woke, it was to the sound of Lakhri and Eeth speaking softly.

"Morning," she said through a yawn, stretching her arms and legs out long. "Is it still morning? Master, how are you feeling?" This all came out pretty fast, not giving either of them a chance to answer the first question before she'd asked the second.

"A bit better," said Eeth quietly, and still in a rather scratchy voice. "And, yes, it is still morning."

"Which means you need to have breakfast," said Lakhri. "Healers' orders."

He put a menu under Raven's nose. "Choose," he said. "Or shall I choose for you?"

Raven seemed placated at hearing Eeth was feeling better'. Still, she looked to Lakhri, wrinkled her nose but accepted the menu. "Ug. I just open my eyes, and you're already talking about food. That's so typical," Raven complained. She took the menu, though, because if she didn't eat, the healers weren't going to let her out. "Do you want something to eat?" Raven asked Lakhri, thinking it was a silly question the moment she posed it. Lakhri could always eat, and she liked that about him.

Lakhri grinned. "If I want something to eat?" he asked. "That must have been a rhetorical question. I always do. Besides, I haven't had a bite of breakfast yet. If nobody makes me" – he threw a pointed look at Eeth – "there is no way I will get up at six. Give me the menu when you're done."

He accepted the datapad and punched in an order for a huge breakfast.

"Of course, how could I forget about your hollow legs," Raven replied, sitting up a little taller and tossing her legs over the side.

A short time later the food arrived, and it had Raven turning another shade of pale. "Oh, no… Come on, Lakhri. You can't be serious," the padawan said, covering her nose; if the smell was getting to her, she could not imagine what it was doing to Eeth. "Master are, are you going to puke?"

Eeth swallowed forcefully. "No," he finally said, "but I am close to doing so. Lakhri, did you absolutely have to order scrambled eggs and bacon?"

Lakhri looked at both of them guiltily. "I did not think the smell would affect you this much," he admitted. "I will take my tray to the garden and eat there if you bully Raven into eating her toast."

Eeth gave Raven his trademark look. "Eat your toast," he ordered in a tone that brooked no further debate, then sank back into his pillow while Lakhri hurried to take his tray out.

Raven looked from Lakhri to Eeth as he gave the order, eyes wide and face still covered with her hand. She was going to eat, though. Just as soon as the smell dissipated.

Eeth closed his eyes and waited for a moment. When nothing happened, he said, "Padawan, Lakhri and his bacon are gone. Eat."

"Yes, master." Yet Raven felt far from hungry right now, and she was not inclined to eat. Thus, she prodded at the toast for a while, trying to work up the courage.

"Padawan," Eeth murmured after two further minutes had passed, "I am not up to enforcing compliance. I am going to call a healer."

Before Raven had a chance to protest this, he had pressed the call button. He had not lied: he was too exhausted to do anything more than that.

"Wait, I'm just working myself up to it!" Raven protested, but it was too late. The door swished open and Healer Mathew entered.

"What's wrong?" he asked in concern.

"She is not eating," croaked Eeth without opening his eyes.

Mathew frowned and rested his hand on Eeth's forehead. "Go back to sleep," he said gently. "You're exhausted. I'll take care of your padawan." He must have helped Eeth along because a moment later, the Jedi master's facial features relaxed and he breathed deeply and regularly.

Mathew turned towards Raven now.

Raven stared back at him like a bantha caught in headlights but said nothing.

"Your master told you to eat," said Mathew in a no-nonsense tone of voice. "And I'm telling you to eat, too. So you had better start eating." He knew for a fact that Raven was, at this point, not too sick to keep food down. She might not feel like eating but in all likelihood, her stomach would settle down once it was no longer empty.

Raven glanced over at Eeth who was still fast asleep thanks to Mathew. Ordinarily, arguing with a healer was something she wouldn't try on, but Mathew was young, so… "Why should I have to eat if my body doesn't want it?"

"Because your body needs it," said Mathew firmly. "The nausea is simply a part of the disease and made worse by the fact that you haven't eaten in a while. Once you actually get something solid on your stomach, you will begin to feel less nauseated. I would rather not stick a tube back in you unless you're actually going to be sick, in which case we will have to keep you in another day. Is this the case?"

"No," Raven huffed because what options did she have here? None, and it frustrated her. Annoyed, the padawan snatched the toast from her plate, took a bite and chewed. "There," she said, tossing the toast back on to her plate with a little more force than intended. Raven could only blink in disbelief as the toast sailed clean off her plate and onto the floor, yucky side down. Fuck. She hadn't meant to do that. Sure, she was ticked off and frustrated but she hadn't actually meant to ditch her food, and her expression now said as much.

Mathew's mouth tightened into a firm line. Wordlessly, he picked up the piece of toast and tossed it into the recycler. He punched in an order for another serve to be delivered and turned back to Raven.

"Lie down," he ordered.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to do that," Raven apologised. She wasn't sure if he was annoyed at her or not, yet neither did she like the expression on his face. Thus, she lay down without argument.

Mathew calmly and firmly wrapped an arm behind her knees, folded them up into her chest and proceeded to deliver three firm swats to a now well-presented under curve. Raven yelped at each smack; his hand was hard like Eeth's although he did not use half as much force as her master would have. That said, he didn't need to as in her current state, it did not take much for him to make his point.

Releasing her legs, Mathew said, "When your toast arrives, you will eat it without complaint, without any further temper tantrums, and above all, without inconveniencing your master. Is that understood?"

Okay, so that had not been the worst punishment Raven had ever received but it still hurt; his hand was large, and her backside was not. She looked over at Eeth, relieved to see that he had slept through that fiasco. Force, had she pulled that attitude on him, shit would have surely been trumps. It was with that thought in mind that she met Mathew with a guilty expression. "Yes, Mathew… I'm sorry." And Raven really was; as frustrated as she had felt in the moment, she wasn't a toddler.

"Good," said Mathew, moving to clean up the small mess of jam on the tiles. When the second serving of her breakfast arrived, Raven took a bite and discovered that thankfully, Mathew was right. As the toast settled on her stomach she did actually begin to feel a little better, not that she wanted to say as much, especially after he'd whacked her.

Lakhri returned a little while later and was glad to see that Eeth was asleep, Raven was eating and a healer was apparently looking after both of them.

"So you're able to keep your food down?" he asked kindly, sitting down on her bed and tousling her hair affectionately. "How are you feeling?"

"Better, I guess. The nausea isn't so bad now that your smelly breakfast is gone," Raven replied, trying not to look sullen.

"Now that you have eaten some toast, you mean," said Mathew, grinning slightly as he disinfected and washed off his hands. When Raven just gave him a sheepish look, he continued. "Master Koth will probably sleep for a while, as he should. Knight Tumuel, you are free to take Raven to the garden or to the pools or any place within the healers' wing. If you feel up to it, Padawan Raven, you may try to walk. But if that exhausts you, don't. If you rush things, you might just relapse, and we don't want that. And you should have regular meals from now on, much as you might not feel like it."

No, Raven did not feel like it, nor had she entirely forgiven Mathew for swatting her, deserved as it was. Thus, she folded her arms. The problem with this was that Raven really did want to recover and obeying the healers' instructions was the only way that was going to happen. She gave Lakhri a lopsided smile. It wasn't her typical thousand-watt-all-teeth kind of smile, but it was a start. "Pools?"

* * *

That day was spent much as the previous, meaning that Raven slept a lot, asked after Eeth a lot and generally tried to keep off the healers' shit list. Lakhri did take her to the pools which was a welcome distraction, yet he also stood there and watched as she ate morning tea, lunch, afternoon tea… By dinner Raven was growing accustomed to the routine and so when the food arrived, she began eating without protest.

She had long finished her meal, and Lakhri was still busy devouring an enormous bowl of grain stew, when Healer Sopan entered. She first checked on Eeth, who was dozing. Then she stepped up to Raven, scanned her observations chart and monitored her through the Force. "Alright," she finally said. "You may go home tomorrow morning if Knight Tumuel promises to make sure that you avoid physical exercise for a week, that you eat regular meals and that you come in for a check-up every day. – Not that you will likely need convincing to do the latter, seeing that your master is still here."

"I promise," Lakhri said mock-solemnly, rising briefly from his chair and bowing deeply.

Healer Sopan smiled a little. "I'll hold you to that promise," she said equally mock-solemnly and continued in a lighter tone of voice, "Small and frequent meals, ideally five times per day, will prevent the nausea from reoccurring. They can be light meals but they should contain some solid food; more than just broth or juice."

Lakhri nodded. "What about classes?" he asked. "The new cycle of classes starts tomorrow."

"If you feel that she's up to it, she can go the day after tomorrow," said Sopan. "But I will excuse her from homework for the first few days. Spending a morning in classes will be more than enough for her. She might need some rest after that or even a nap. We will see how much school work is reasonable during our daily check-ups."

Looking at Raven, she asked, "Any questions?"

"No," answered Raven. Afterall, hearing that homework and classes were going to be a bit easier on her was welcomed news, especially so as she was about to start a cycle of remedial maths.

Lakhri thought of that as well. "Seems as if the healers are not permitting me to fill all your free time with maths study, then," he said. "That will be a blow to Eeth. But I'm sure he'll find a way to make up for it."

"Indeed he will," croaked Eeth unexpectedly; he had drifted awake a while ago and overheard their conversation. "Lakhri, make sure you get those five meals per day into my padawan so she makes a full recovery as soon as possible and can give all her attention to her remedial maths class. Virus or no virus, you will pass that class with flying colours, padawan."

In all the excitement Raven had forgotten about Eeth's edict to fill her every waking second with maths. Her face scrunched. "Master, I've been sick. Can't you just take my word for it that I'll study?" The idea of having all her free time taken up with maths was not at all appealing, especially so for an entire cycle! She would never see the padawans' lounge again.

"I did so last cycle," Eeth said, and for the first time, some masterly tone of voice was discernible under the rasp in his voice. "That was obviously a mistake."

"Yes, yes, I'll make sure she studies once the healers allow it, and more importantly, I'll make sure she eats," said Lakhri.

"Good," said Sopan, rising from her stool. "No exercise and Force work whatsoever until we give our explicit permission. Is that clear, Padawan Trebeck?"

Raven wasn't sure whether or not to be pleased that Eeth was getting his mojo back, or depressed because of what it would mean for her. She decided on the former for now and turned her attention to Sopan. "Yes, healer Sopan, crystal," she replied. At the moment the last thing on her mind was physical activity, although lying about all day was not easy for her either. Well, they would just have to make do.

"Alright," said Healer Sopan, giving them a brief smile before leaving them for the night.

* * *

Lakhri came in the next morning to take Raven home – after having made her eat some breakfast. Healer Nadeem gave Raven one last check and declared her ready to leave the healers.

"Bring her in tomorrow after school," he told Lakhri.

"Will do," said Lakhri. "Now, we don't really have anything to pack as your mission packs have already been brought to your quarters. I've unpacked them for both of you. I brought you a clean uniform, though. Why don't you take a shower and get dressed? Maybe Eeth will be awake by then so we can talk to him before we leave."

"Alright," replied Raven and went to do as told.

A little over half an hour later – it took her longer than usual given how slow she was moving – Raven emerged from the refresher, bag in hand and feeling a bit more human. Not to mention the lack of assless hospital gown was doing a lot to return her sense of normality!

"Thank you for bringing my clothes, Lakhri, there is just something intrinsically wrong about leaving the healers' wing clad in a hospital gown," she said. Sitting on the bed that she'd occupied for the last few days was also preferable to being confined to it.

"Master, you're awake. How do you feel?"

"I am alright, padawan," Eeth replied mildly. He was still pale, but the greenish tinge to his skin had gone and he could keep his eyes open now for more than a minute if the light was not too bright.

"I hear you are allowed to leave," he told Raven. "Just a word of caution before you head home. If I hear you have been any trouble to Lakhri, especially with regard to the healers' instructions, you will be in trouble with me as well. It might be a while until I am strong enough to deal out any kind of punishment, but I will not forget. Are we clear about that?"

He knew he was being insensitive. He also knew that his freedom-loving padawan would try to escape her restrictions at the first opportunity that presented itself.

"Yes, master, clear," said Raven, wrinkling her nose at his threat. Given her track record with imposed bed-rest and the like, she didn't think him insensitive, not really. "You're still pale," she commented, leaning over and hugging him. "I can stay and keep you company if you want, I don't mind. We could play exploding starships or I could read to you."

"Thank you, padawan," Eeth replied, returning the hug a little stiffly, and he meant it. "But you would get bored quickly, and I am not very good company yet. At the moment I crave nothing more than peace and quiet. I will be happy for you to drop by this afternoon, but there is really no need for you to guard my sleep."

"We'll see you right after lunch," Lakhri promised. "Is there anything we can get you from your quarters?"

Eeth thought for a moment. Then he shook his head regretfully. "I would love to ask for a clean set of clothes, but there is no point," he replied. "I feel like passing out even at the thought of something as simple as getting dressed, and besides, there is no way I could, given all these tubes."

"As soon as that changes, tell me and I'll get you all the formal robes you want," said Lakhri with a grin.

He helped Raven off the bed, gave Eeth a brief hug, bowed to Healer Nadeem, and they were off to the turbo lifts.


	8. Chapter 8

"I wish Eeth was coming home with us," Raven told Lakhri absentmindedly as they entered her and Eeth's quarters. It had been just a few days since Eeth and Raven had returned from Borleias where they had contracted a virus from the Neimoidian delegates. Eeth had come off second best, having been struck with a mutant variant explicitly created for Zabrak, which was why he was still laid up in the healer's wing while Raven was allowed to leave. Lakhri was going to take care of her, though, which the padawan was looking forward to. Still, she felt it only fair to remind him that she was getting older and such coddling was no longer necessary. "You know, you can let me stay here alone. I mean, I don't actually need babysitting any more. I'm going to be thirteen soon," Raven announced proudly, the very thought of officially being a teenager making the girl positively giddy.

Lakhri snorted. "Yeah, right. The healers and Eeth would both want my head for that; I'd just have to decide whom to hand it to first. Nope. I'm staying with you." He plopped down on the couch and started pulling off his boots which he flung carelessly into a corner, capitalising on the fact that Eeth was not there to admonish him.

"So, what were the hyperspace communications frequencies actually like?" he asked.

Raven sat down on one of the single couches and lay back to pull off her own boots. "The actual conference itself was the most boring event I've ever had the displeasure of enduring," she replied. "That said, Eeth did let me play vossball, and we went swimming in the ocean, too. We were even going to take an extra day to explore the jungle, until…" The padawan blushed. "Well, until I made myself a little unpopular. To be honest, I don't know if he would have still allowed it if I hadn't gotten sick and we had to leave."

"Vossball?" said Lakhri. "Man, you've got Eeth wrapped around your little finger! At least compared to me. Everything is relative. What did you do to make yourself unpopular?"

"Where do I start?" Raven said, more to herself than to Lakhri, and grunted as her boot finally came off. She dropped it to the floor. Typically such an action would garner a scolding from Eeth, yet this was one of the things she liked about having Lakhri around; she got to be just a little bit untidy. Smiling, Raven flopped backwards, one boot on and one off. "Firstly, I allowed myself to be coerced into helping a group of kids exact some revenge on another group of kids. It was kinda like a mini civil war of sorts if you think about it," she mused. "It was not worth the encounter with the slipper from hell, though. Force, Eeth went postal on my ass. Has he ever taken to you with a freakin' shoe before? I thought I was going to die."

"He did," said Lakhri, "and it wasn't fun. However, it was positively enjoyable to what Eeth did when he punished me for anything with the word 'revenge' in it. He has been known to go out of his way to explore the local fauna on some backwater planet, just to find something that equals his cane."

Lakhri grimaced at the memory and rose to pull off Raven's second boot for her. After all, she was supposed to take it easy.

Raven appreciated his help, and her expression said as much when the second boot came off without her having to sit up again. "I wasn't in it for the revenge; I learnt that lesson with Nereem." Now it was Raven's turn to grimace. "Which is probably why I didn't cop the mean and evil treatment. Anyway, as if that weren't bad enough, a few days later I missed the start of the afternoon conference break, and before you say anything," she held up a finger. "I did set my alarm. It wasn't my fault, well, not entirely. I got mowed down by some crazy person who couldn't pilot their way out of a wet paper bag. It wasn't so much that I was late that annoyed Eeth, though. It was the fact that I tried to get out of a worse punishment by running right from the track to the conference covered in mud and then attempted to sneak in the rear fire door. The freakin' alarm went off. Eeth was pissed, and he whaled my ass with the slipper. Again."

"Ouch," said Lakhri. He tried to sound sympathetic, and he was; it was just that he had to laugh when he mentally pictured the scene. "Yeah, I can totally see how that would have gone over spectacularly well," he said, grinning.

Okay, so even Raven had to smile a bit at that; although it sure as shit hadn't been funny at the time.

"Now, what would you like to do this morning?" continued Lakhri. "You're not supposed to do anything exhausting, so that leaves… reading, or watching holos. Or we could play a game."

"Holos, I guess. I haven't watched anything good in ages. You know what Eeth's like with that." She waved a hand at the holo sensor as if to flick it off, and in a perfect imitation of her master uttered: "Padawan, no holo channel before you have completed your chores." She smiled at Lakhri. It was cathartic to make fun of Eeth's rigid ways. Besides, nobody understood as Lakhri did.

Lakhri chortled. "Yes, he'd hate for you to amuse yourself when there's still some dust to be cleaned," he said. "And there's ALWAYS some dust to be cleaned. Well, while you were gone, cleaning droids were taking care of all the dust in your quarters, and I haven't ordered them off yet. Given that you're meant to be taking it easy, I think we can use their services for a few more days. Anyway, go ahead and watch the holo. And while you do, have a snack. What would you like?"

"I agree. Force, if I have to miss out on everything fun, it stands to reason that I miss out on some of the crap I don't like, too. Seems only fair." Raven turned on the screen and started flicking through the database for some nature program. She paused for a moment, contemplating his question. What would she like? Honestly? Nothing. Her nose wrinkled. "Is it really that time already?" Raven wouldn't give him a hard time over this, but it felt like she had only just eaten breakfast.

"Not quite, but it will be soon," said Lakhri. "And I'm not going to have an argument with you every time you need to eat so just dispense with the complaints and tell me what to bring you."

"Hey, you have to at least wait for me to complain first before you can chew me out over it. I'm pretty sure that's in the master's handbook, right under the subheading 'the apprentice is always right'," Raven said with mock-indignation.

"I was anticipating your complaint," said Lakhri, "and I totally think I've anticipated it correctly. Now tell me what you'd like to eat…" He switched into a tone of voice that was remarkably like Eeth's and continued, "… because I do not like repeating myself, padawan."

"You do that scaringly well," Raven admitted, grinning. "Could I try some fruit, please?"

"You absolutely could," said Lakhri, "because I did a huge load of grocery shopping last night."

He went to the kitchen and cut up some star fruit. He also prepared two cups of a spicy, milky hot drink that was made of oats and had become popular on Coruscant recently. He thought Raven might enjoy it.

"Here you are," he said, placing the plate of fruit and the cup in front of Raven. He found a datapad and plopped into an armchair, intending to continue reading his novel.

Raven thanked him, despite wanting to eat about as much as she wanted a hole in the head. She did so, though, as messing with Lakhri was almost as bad as messing with Eeth. Sure, it took him longer to start swatting, but when he did, it wasn't pleasant.

"Unpleasant" turned out to be kind of a recurring theme for Eeth and Raven during the following days. There was some improvement, but it was not as much as both of them had hoped.

The morning after Raven had gone home, Eeth woke up feeling reasonably well-rested. Unfortunately, this also meant that he acutely noticed how sweaty and dirty he was. Ever since having escaped Nar Shaddaa, he had been meticulous about his personal hygiene and his outer appearance as long as circumstances permitted it, which was why he was quite disgusted with himself but, of course, far too weak to take a shower or anything of that kind. Healer Arkan agreed to take him to the pools – in a hoverchair, since Eeth was nowhere near close to being able to walk. When they returned from there, the number of tubes to which Eeth was attached was reduced slightly and he was allowed to change into a kind of sleepsuit instead of a hospital gown. He also managed to sip some water without throwing up. All that activity proved too much and he promptly fell asleep.

When Lakhri and Raven entered his room in the early afternoon, he was sitting upright in his bed wearing a fresh tunic and a pair of wide pants, his hair clean and plaited into two shiny braids. He was meditating, but opened his eyes immediately when he sensed them approach.

"Master, you're sitting up, and you have fewer tubes hanging out of you! Oh, and you have normal clothes on, too. Uh, well, kinda normal. Eesh, did the Yentles have a garage sale or what?" Raven said upon spotting his wide pants.

"Well, I still need assistance with some bodily functions, which precludes normal clothing" Eeth said with unparalleled dignity. "But yes, I am sitting up, I have taken a bath and managed to remain awake for more than thirty minutes at a time. I think that may be counted as definite progress."

Yes, that definitely counted as progress. Raven glanced at his bedside, noting the lack of bag. "You still got that catheter, or did they just hide it?"

"No, actually I am without the catheter," Eeth replied, "but as I am unable to make it to the refresher, the healers will still need to help. How are you doing?"

"I'm okay. Lakhri's been making all my favourite things, and I haven't even puked. Are you still puking?"

"Well, I have drunk a bit of water and managed to keep it down," Eeth said. "Eating is out of the question, for now."

"I remember the feeling. It gets better, although the first day of solid food is pretty rough." At that moment Healer Sopan entered to check on Raven. By now the padawan knew the drill, and so she pulled herself up onto the vacant bed by Eeth's, pulled off her tunic and lay back without being asked.

Thankfully, Sopan proclaimed Raven's recovery to be progressing well enough, yet the lethargy lingered. Both Raven and Eeth had been warned to expect as much, but it was easier to accept in theory than in practice. As if to add insult to injury, as Raven began to feel well enough to do more than sit around on the couch, Lakhri started setting her maths work. It wasn't much at first, but by the third day, she was growing tired of it. "No more, pleeease?" Raven groaned when Lakhri produced her datapad for the third time that day. She was feeling up to visiting the padawans' lounge tonight and had planned on asking if she could go, but if Lakhri made her do this, it would take up all the time she had free before her curfew.

Lakhri raised his eyebrows. "You flunked your maths exam, remember?" he said. "You've been put in a remedial maths class and if you ever want to get out of it, you need to pass the exam. Right now, your knowledge of everything you were supposed to learn last term is close to zero. So, the more work you put in, the more likely it is that you will eventually be able to drop maths. Besides, Eeth asked me to study with you whenever you feel well enough. Do you?"

"If I say no, you're not going to let me go to the lounge instead, are you?" Raven replied, dragging a hand down her face. At this rate, returning to classes was starting to seem like a better deal.

"If you had said no before you asked that question, I would have sent you straight to bed," said Lakhri. "As it is, if you're well enough to go to the lounge, you're well enough to study maths."

Bed or maths. Both of those options were equally unappealing, and it showed in Raven's unenthusiastic expression. She did it, though. When, finally, Lakhri pronounced the work satisfactory, Raven stood and stretched. "I think I'm well enough to go back to classes tomorrow. Force, it might just end up being less work than hanging around here," she added, a lopsided grin on her face. That was probably not true, but at least it wouldn't all be maths!

Lakhri grinned. "Am I that bad?" he asked. "Oh well. I had better send you off to school, then. I'm sure Master Vantachi has missed you already."

"The sentiment is entirely unreciprocated," Raven replied upon hearing his comment on Vantachi. She was not looking forward to his class. Then again, it was only for an hour or so and then she'd get to do something else. Besides, Raven was starting to become restless holed up in their quarters, and that had never boded well for anyone. "No, you aren't that bad, but the maths you're making me do is. Anyway, it would be nice to see my friends again. They're probably all worried and want to know what happened on Borleias."

"Definitely," said Lakhri. "Eeth's sickness is the talk of the Temple. My classes have suddenly become really popular because people are hoping for some first-hand information." He hesitated for a moment. Then he said, "I would like you to have lunch with me tomorrow so I can make sure you eat. But I know you'll need some time with your friends, so, if you do a good job with your class work, you may have an hour or two in the lounge after dinner tomorrow." He knew that Eeth had promised to make Raven do maths pretty much during every waking hour but even Eeth would have to concede that upholding such a policy for an entire term was not realistic, he decided. And if Eeth disagreed, Lakhri was entirely willing to argue his case. Making Raven do maths for three days in a row had already been exhausting. Force, he deserved a break!

"For real?" Raven didn't want to look a gift bantha in the mouth here, but Eeth had tasked her to endless maths and that Lakhri was allowing her to deviate from that sounded too good to be true.

"Yeah, for real," said Lakhri. "Having you do maths and nothing but maths for the entire term would just drive you crazy, I suppose. And me as well. Eeth wouldn't want to have to deal with two crazy people once he's released, so there you are."

"Hey, I'm not arguing with you here," Raven said, holding up both hands in mock-placation. If Lakhri was going to try getting her out of this, then Raven wasn't about to stop him. "Curiously, did he ever make you do endless 'anything'?" She wasn't sure how to phrase that question as it was unlikely that classwork had ever been an issue for Lakhri.

Lakhri pondered this and then shook his head. "Not like this," he said. "I mean, never related to classwork and not for an entire term. I've done a lot more household chores than I care to remember, though. I was fairly untidy and careless with the state of my clothing. The amount of holes Eeth made me mend! And he once kept me grounded for about three days until I had cleaned my room and refresher to his satisfaction."

Raven couldn't hide the slight smile. "He can be like that," she agreed. And really, Raven could understand where Lakhri was coming from.

* * *

The following morning Raven was up, showered and dressed without being prompted. She was looking forward to seeing her friends and, most of all, keen to spend some time free from confinement. "Lakhri," she greeted her Jedi brother with a curt bow. Such formalities were typically reserved for Eeth, yet sometimes she felt the gesture was warranted. Today was one such day. Why? Because If you didn't include making her do copious amounts of maths (which she was blaming on Eeth anyway), Lakhri had been good to her since they had returned from Borleias. He was even letting her have some free time tonight which Eeth wouldn't have allowed. Raven wanted to show some gratitude for that. "Need help with breakfast?" she asked, tossing her datapad onto their dining room table. Her energy levels were still not up to par, but she was far from pushing herself.

"I'm nearly done," said Lakhri, smiling at her. "Could you finish setting the table?"

He had prepared porridge and made it richer than usual since it needed to sustain Raven through her morning of classes. He had also packed her a box of sliced fruit.

"Try to eat these during break," he said, handing the box to Raven. "You're still pale and thinner than you ought to be."

"I'm fine," Raven waved him off. She wasn't, but she didn't want him to worry any more than he already was. Thus, the box was accepted with a nod, and she went about setting the table as asked.

A little while later, Lakhri shooed her out of the door to her first lesson, which was Basic. And sitting in that class was none other than Rayan Haysh, Raven's nemesis from creche, who had been chosen as a padawan just five days before his thirteenth birthday, about a week ago. He had attended his new classes for a few days now and it seemed to him that wherever he went, people were talking about Raven Trebeck and her master Eeth Koth. It was extremely annoying and it brought up old jealousies that he had thought to have conquered. Why had it been Raven who had been chosen by Eeth Koth, a member of the Jedi High Council, and not him? What was so special about her? And why was it always her who received all the attention?

And so it was that, as Raven entered the classroom, Rayan was sitting at the desk in front of her, shooting her a dirty look. He had no opportunity to do more than that because – how typical! – a bunch of people converged on her. "Raven! You're back! How are you doing? How's your master? What happened? Is it true that Mace Windu bullied the Neimoidians into healing him?" And so on, and so forth. As if there was nothing more important in the world than some padawan who had recovered from a virus!

"Yeah, if it weren't for Mace kicking some Neimoidian ass, Eeth would have probably died." Raven replied. Okay, so the onslaught of questions was not exactly unexpected; even still, she was so happy to get back to classes and see her friends again that she gladly endured the interrogation.

"Was it that bad? It would have killed him for real?" someone asked, only to be cut off.

"What about you? Was yours a lethal variant, too?"

Raven sat on a desk; the walk here, and all the excitement had hit her harder than she expected. "Yeah, it was that bad. Eeth would have died. He's strong, but he's not invincible." Raven would have argued to the contrary a week ago, yet watching her master struggle for his life had been a sobering lesson in mortality.

The room was silent as Raven told the story of how they had contracted the virus and what had happened afterwards. "So, our mission turned out to be far from boring for all the wrong reasons," she concluded.

"Well, at least your master gets to take a break from you," Rayan murmured before he could help it. "That must be nice for him." He said it quietly but loud enough for Raven to hear. At this precise moment, Knight Motamen entered the room.

"Padawan Trebeck!" she said. "It's good to see you back. How are you doing?" Privately, she thought that the girl looked rather thin and pale.

Raven looked from Rayan to their teacher and then back again, her expression a mixture of shock and surprise. Rayan Haysh? What in the name of the Force was he doing here? Immediately, a replay of the run-in they'd had in the creche garden flashed to mind. He had goaded her into a fight that was so serious that they were reported to the Council by Knight Bat. Yes, Raven remembered the name of the random knight who had prised them apart, even though it had been over a year ago now. She also remembered how disappointed Eeth was when he found out that she had been fighting, not to mention the repercussions he had imposed, which had been dire, to say the least. Her expression hardened, but she ignored Rayan for the time being and greeted her teacher.

Through the entire class, Raven remained unfocused. How had Rayan ended up here? Eeth had said that the Council had called a meeting to discuss his future in the Order, and as far as she knew, it had been decided that he'd end up going to serve in the AgriCorps. Apparently, that had not happened. Who had taken him on? What had happened? Thankfully, her inattention was overlooked as there wasn't a person in the Temple who didn't know what had happened to Eeth and his apprentice. Thus, her teachers were a lot more lenient with her than they might have been otherwise.

Rayan was, in fact, a little sorry for his snide remark which, as he could see, had upset Raven. Yeah, well, he had meant it to – but then, he was a Jedi padawan now and such a thing was not exactly Jedi-like. Should he actually go as far as to apologise to the girl? He knew that was what his master would expect, and he was very keen on pleasing his master. After all, the man had taken him on when everybody else seemed to have given up on him! Rayan felt a huge sense of loyalty to Master Barada for that, and he wanted to make him proud. Still, apologising to Raven, of all people, did not come easy to him. He was still indecisive when class ended and the students started to file out, hoping that Raven would be gone before he reached the door, which would relieve him of his dilemma.

Unfortunately for Rayan, Raven had a few things to say to him, none of which included apologies either accepted or reciprocated. Of course she had no idea that he planned to apologise, or even that he had felt bad for his comments. Thus, when she approached him on the way out, her expression was far from forgiving. "Look, I don't know what master in their right mind decided to take you on, but if you say another word about Eeth and his supposed distaste for my company, I'm going to jam my boot so far up your ass that your liver will carry the imprint." She stepped into his personal space, her eyes locked on his. "He almost died. I almost died. You think that's a joking matter?" Raven stood as tall as she could, which was not very tall at all, yet she had learned a thing or two about intimidation, having been apprenticed to the strictest master in the Temple.

Rayan frowned at her, affronted. "No, the fact that he took you as a padawan at all is a joking matter," he spat, "and I'll thank you to keep your comments about Master Barada to yourself."

"You need new material," Raven scoffed and pushed past him. The truth was that Rayan had dragged up old insecurities about her worthiness to be apprenticed to a master of Eeth's status that she had thought were long buried.

By the end of classes that day, Raven was still thinking about Rayan's comments. She had always found it difficult to let go of things. Of course, the padawan knew to meditate in order to rid herself of such baggage, yet Eeth was still in the healers' wing, and she didn't want to admit to Lakhri that some stupid boy had upset her over something equally stupid as insecurities over her place with Eeth. It did not improve her mood, though, and as much was apparent when she entered their quarters for lunch that afternoon, a slight scowl on her face as she headed directly for her bedroom.

"Raven?" Lakhri called from the kitchen where he had just finished heating the stew he had ordered from the dining hall. "Ummm… could you come here?" Apparently, the day had not gone too well but he had no idea why that might have been the case.

"Coming," Raven yelled from her bedroom. It was hardly an unexpected request; had this been Eeth, there would have been some lecture on disrespect to endure at the least. Lakhri hadn't done anything to deserve it either, which had her feeling guilty at not having at least greeted the man before seeking out solitude. Sighing, Raven threw her datapad on her bed and sat to pull off her boots. It was an effort after today, yet she managed.

"Heya, Lakhri," she greeted him, offering a slightly sheepish smile. "You want me to help?"

"Not really," said Lakhri. "I just would prefer you to say hi and tell me how the day went before disappearing into your bedroom. You look exhausted. Are you alright?"

"I'm okay. Today was just tiring is all." Raven considered confiding in Lakhri and asking for his help with Rayan, but really, this was something she ought to handle herself. Besides, he was just a stupid boy, and she could deal with stupid well enough. Lakhri did not buy this for a moment but since he did not get the impression that Raven had cause to feel guilty over anything she might have done wrong, he did not press the matter any further.

Raven ate lunch without complaint although eating was still an ordeal for her. Then she took her plate to the sink and helped tidy up. No teacher had assigned her any homework, as the healers had given her a few days off of this, which was a welcome relief. However, if today was like the last few days, Lakhri was probably going to assign her something maths orientated. Raven wanted to avoid that, and so she made for her bedroom before he could start giving orders.

"Raven, stop," said Lakhri firmly. "That's the second time today that you head off to your room without a word when you know perfectly well that I might have something to say. Do you think Eeth would put up with this kind of behaviour for even one second?"

"Lakhri, come on, give me a break," Raven complained, turning back to face him and folding her arms across her chest. No, Eeth wouldn't have stood for this, but then, Lakhri wasn't Eeth and perhaps she was trying to take advantage of that fact just a little bit. Well, given the day she'd had, it wasn't exactly the worst crime, or so she told herself.

"Only if you lose the attitude," said Lakhri. "Last night I told you you'd get a break tonight if you did a good job with your school work, but you haven't done any yet. Incidentally, how did Vantachi's class go?"

At this, Raven dropped her arms to her sides in an effort at losing the supposed 'attitude'. "It went well enough. There are only three of us so that's kinda humiliating. Otherwise, Vantachi is his usual charming self. I believe your analogy with the hot poker is still an accurate character reference."

"Yes, well, why don't you just forget about that analogy?" Lakhri said, embarrassed at having behaved in such a less than grown-up way.

Raven cocked an eyebrow. She had always found Lakhri's frank appraisals of certain teachers refreshing. Oh, well, she guessed that maybe it wasn't the smartest or even the kindest thing to bring up when Eeth was tearing her a new one over failing his class.

"Anyway," continued Lakhri, "I want you to do some maths this afternoon. But you look as though you're in need of a nap first. Go and lie down for a while. If you can't sleep, read or do something quiet. Try to get some rest. I'll fetch you at around four for a snack, our usual trip to the healers and then – well, maths."

Raven scrunched up her face at hearing there would be yet more maths in her future, not to mention the fact that he was apparently sending her to take a nap. A nap! It was two in the afternoon, for the Force's sake. Again, there wasn't a lot she could do about this; arguing would probably result in yet more maths. Resigned, Raven nodded and headed for her bedroom. This was all Rayan's fault! He was managing to mess up her life with nothing more than his presence.

Lakhri frowned at her retreating back. He was going to let the matter rest, for now, but he just hoped for Raven's sake that she was going to do as told.

Raven lay on her bed, staring up at the ceiling, arms folded and a frown creasing her brow. She wouldn't let Rayan's comments get to her. It was all nonsense, and he was just jealous. The Force had led her to Eeth and him to her, and there was no mistaking that he was meant to be her master. Raven felt it with every fibre of her being. So why, then, did it hurt her to hear Rayan disagreed? Raven closed her eyes and released her emotions into the Force. The next thing she knew Lakhri was standing over her, a hand on her shoulder.

"Come on," Lakhri said kindly. "Time to wake up or you won't be able to sleep tonight. I made you some Senchi spicy hot chocolate. When you've finished it, we can go and see Eeth."

"Thanks, Lakhri," she said groggily and rolled off her bed. The rest had done little to improve her mood but at least she was no longer fixated on the return of Rayan Haysh. The hot chocolate was delicious. Raven drank every drop even though she didn't feel like it. "I hope Eeth will be able to come home soon," she commented while sitting on their couch to pull on her boots.

"Don't hold your breath," said Lakhri as he put on his cloak. "He's still too weak to stand. I'd say the healers are going to keep him for at least one more week. That freakin' Neimoidian virus really did a number on him. I've never seen him like this, ever."

"Yeah, I know. He scared the crap out of me, too," Raven confided.

They walked slowly since Raven wasn't nearly as speedy as she typically was. She was improving faster than Eeth, though, which, of course, worried her.

When they entered Eeth's room, the healers were waiting for her. Raven sighed; the last thing she felt up to right now was being poked and prodded at, yet like with a lot of things in her life, there wasn't a choice.

"Master," she said, offering Eeth a slight bow, and jumped up on the bed beside him, already pulling her tunic off over her head in anticipation of the healer's orders. "How are you feeling?"

Eeth gave her a small smile. He was sitting in a half-upright position; the blinds were drawn open since the light no longer hurt his eyes.

"I am improving, albeit slowly," he said. "Healer Nadeem took me to the pools this morning. I was able to manage the two steps from the hoverchair to the edge of the pool but there was no way I could get up and make the way back." He turned away for a moment as a dry cough wracked him. Lakhri stepped up to him and rested a hand on his shoulder, gazing at Healer Sopan in concern.

"Your master," said Healer Sopan, "has developed a cough that weakens him. It seems to be a suprainfection. Zabrak rarely fall ill but when they do, they do it thoroughly. But don't worry. We can handle the cough. Unlike the virus that originally struck him, it's nothing we haven't seen before."

"You sound horrible," Raven said, concerned And the cough really did sound pretty rough, yet Raven noticed that Eeth bore it with as much dignity as he could muster. That was so typical of him. The padawan lay back when instructed and obeyed Healer Arkan's instructions as he went about checking her over. When he was done, she sat up and reached for her tunic. "Well, am I going to live?" she asked, pulling the tunic on over her head and giving him a smile. If you asked Raven, these checkups were a complete waste of time, and the only reason she didn't protest them was because it meant she got to spend some time with Eeth.

Healer Arkan smiled. "Just," he said. "Actually, you're going to be fine quite soon. I think you'll be able to handle homework, as well as some moderate Force work, by Monday. And from now on, you won't need daily check-ups any longer. Let's do the next one on Sunday. If you feel worse, though, or develop any kind of symptoms you haven't had before, come in immediately. I assume we'll be seeing you every day anyway."

"You need not…" Eeth started to say but Lakhri cut him short because he knew exactly what Eeth was going to say and happened to think it was nonsense. "Of course we want to come here on your account," he said. "It's not as if visiting you is a nuisance. We'll continue visiting you every single day until the healers release you." In a perfect imitation of Eeth's stern-master tone, he added, "And this is not negotiable so you may dispense with any complaints you might want to utter."

The edges of Eeth's mouth twitched slightly but before he could say anything, he was wracked by another coughing fit.

The look Raven gave Arkan at hearing she would be reunited with the joys of homework was pained. However, the look she gave Lakhri after his comments to Eeth was priceless. Why can't I get away with saying stuff like that, the look said.

Lakhri gave her a grin. Raven would get there, he thought; or maybe she was already there. Once Eeth was released from the healers' wing, it would be her job to make sure he did not overtax his strength. As long as it was within those parameters, Lakhri suspected Raven would get away with a great many things because Eeth, while strict, was also generally reasonable about such issues.

They spoke to Eeth for as long as it seemed not to tax him further, and then they left him to recover. "At least I don't have to be poked and prodded at anymore," she said to Lakhri as they entered a turbolift. It was one of the few positive pieces of information that the healers had given her, and she was trying to hang on to it.

"And Eeth will recover as well," Lakhri assured her. "It will just take a while. But if he were still in any danger, Sopan would tell us. I'd say she's a person you can rely on to be honest with you. Like Eeth, in fact."

"I know, I trust Sopan," Raven replied. It was nice to have reassurance, though.

The next few hours were taken up with maths study and, much to Raven's increased displeasure, another snack. She ate it, though, and she did the work without too much grumbling. It wasn't SO bad when Lakhri was helping her out at least. When finally the last solution was completed, Raven let her head flop onto the table dramatically. "Done. Do you want to check it?" she asked without looking up, her voice muffled from having her face buried in her arms.

"Yes," said Lakhri. "If it's correct, you may eat a sandwich or something and go to the lounge."

He looked over the datapad and nodded. "You've got this now," he said. "If you had just asked me for help last cycle, you could have easily mastered these equations before your exam, you know."

"I know." Raven spoke into her arm once again, and then she lifted her head to look at him. She didn't want to go into her reasons for slacking off last cycle as she was pretty sure Lakhri was already across them. "Thanks for letting me go to the lounge tonight, and for hitting Eeth up about the whole study every moment thing."

"Welcome," said Lakhri. He was going to talk to Eeth about this, of course; he had no intention of keeping this from his former master. He suspected that Eeth would be none too thrilled at first but finally concede his point.

He brought Raven a sandwich and waved her off as she left for the lounge. Finally he would get to finish his novel in peace! Looking after a padawan turned out to be hard work.

For some reason, the sandwich did not want to go down tonight. Raven kept at it, though, leaving the crust and going right for the squishy middle. It was the best part, after all. By the time she reached the padawans' lounge, most of it was gone; the effort would have been acceptable and so she tossed the crust into a bin and went in search of her friends. The first day of classes had been tough on her not just physically, but mentally also. Who'd have thought that attaining semi-superstar status would become tiresome? Yeah, well, it kinda had. Or maybe it was just her lack of energy.

"How much longer will your master be in the healer's wing?" Bindi asked. Bindi was one of Raven's closest friends; they had met through Orion on her first evening in the padawans' lounge. That seemed like a lifetime ago now, so much had happened.

"Another week at the least. He's developed a suprainfection that's affecting his lungs. He can barely get out a sentence without breaking into fits of hacking and spluttering," Raven answered, her expression serious.

"That sounds pretty nasty. Can they fix it?" Orion queried.

"Yeah. He's lucky that they know what they're dealing with now so they've already got a treatment ready. I feel for him, though. He doesn't ever complain, but I can tell this is really hard on him."

"I bet. He almost died. It wasn't easy on you, either," Bindi added, putting an arm around Raven's shoulders and noticing with a frown how boney the girl felt. She had lost quite a bit of weight that she didn't have to lose in the first place. "They giving you something for the scrawniness? I mean, this is a bit much, even for you."

Raven snorted. "Lakhri's on my back, don't worry. I have to eat five times a day and believe me, that's hard enough as it is. I almost envy Eeth his tubing." The latter wasn't entirely true, but it got her point across.

"Come on, I'll get us some sweets," said Orion, marching over to the food dispenser in order to sacrifice some of his allowance for getting some additional calories into Raven. When he returned, he noticed the new padawan entering the lounge, a tall human boy with wavy hair and coffee-brown skin. He was with an Iktotchi boy who was also a fairly recent padawan.

"Hey, Raven, isn't that your old nemesis from creche?" he asked as he returned to Raven. He nodded towards Rayan while holding a tray of chocolates out to the others.

Raven's brow creased and her posture stiffened. "That would be him, yes," she replied, her tone matching the change in her appearance.

"I like to think that if someone has taken him on as an apprentice, then he has probably lost a lot of the traits you disliked about him." Bindi was trying to approach this with logic as was typical for her.

"I'd agree, had he not already insulted me. He's in my first period Basic class," replied Raven.

Orion looked surprised at this. "Kid must be gifted with languages if he managed to get into your class as a new padawan."

Raven shrugged. "Pity he uses it to piss people off. He's a nightmare."

"What did he say to you?" Bindi wanted to know because as far as she was concerned, the days when Raven felt insecure in her place as a padawan were long since gone.

Raven thought about that for a moment. She had wanted to confide in Lakhri earlier but had decided against it as it was embarrassing to admit she had let the creep get to her. The same wasn't true with Orion and Bindi; they were her peers not her mentor and as illogical as it was, it was easier to talk to them. She gave a rundown of the exchange between herself and Rayan earlier, noticing that when she was done, the resentment and anger had returned.

"Just let it go," Orion said peacefully. "He's probably just insecure. And hasn't he always been jealous of you? I guess that would just have got worse when Eeth took you as his padawan and not him. Come on. Ignore him and have a chocolate. I just spent this week's allowance on them."

Of the two of them, Orion had always been the voice of reason. Still, Raven found it hard to let things go, she always had. "Thanks, this looks good." Truth was that Raven would rather gnaw off her arm than eat right now, but had to concede that everyone was right: she really did need to gain some weight back. Thus, she accepted not one but two and gave her friend a smile. She was going to take their advice and do her best to ignore Rayan. It was what Eeth would have said, too. Her thoughts returned to her master, who was also looking very drawn and thin. This virus had really done a number on them both.

Rayan, too, tried his best to ignore Raven and focus on finding new friends but this proved to be quite hard. She was right in his line of sight, talking to her friends. At one point, she was gesticulating and they all laughed. Were they talking about him? The loser who had nearly been sent off to AgriCorps? He had no idea if they were but it felt like they did. He talked to Heewes, his new acquaintance but he could not help shooting dirty looks at Raven every once in a while.

"Do you know her?" asked Heewes. "She's Eeth Koth's padawan. Have you heard–"

"Yeah, I have," Rayan said, a tad derisively. "It's the talk of the Temple, for whatever reason. I mean, they're hardly the first Jedi to fall ill during a mission."

"Probably not," said Heewes, "but they're the first to have ever been targeted with a virus that was engineered for them, I guess. From what I heard, Eeth nearly died. They say he and his padawan spent three days immersed in a bacta tank!"

"Well, that's nonsense," said Rayan. "Bacta doesn't help against viruses. I bet it's just Temple gossip. Like, that one girl told me Eeth battled the Neimoidian delegation leader with his lightsaber. As if the Neimoidians were some kind of Sith Lords!"

Heewes laughed. "Yeah, that's a silly one. When I was just made a padawan, this one guy in the lounge tried to convince me that he and his master were eaten by a giant whale during a mission." And thankfully, this was the cue for him to change the subject. Still, Rayan was less than happy that Raven, once again, seemed to be at the centre of attention.

The looks Rayan was aiming Raven's way did not go unnoticed. Raven doggedly ignored them at first, but after a while, it started to grate on her. "He keeps giving me the stink eye," she commented, caught between irritation and confusion; did he really hate her that much? Really? It might have been flattering had it not been so annoying.

"So let's switch places, then," Bindi suggested.

Raven sighed, but before she could stand, her wristwatch vibrated. "I have to get back."

Neither of her friends questioned the early return. Raven had been seriously ill, and if she had to get extra sleep, then that was just the way it was.

A short time later, Raven arrived at her quarters, right on time. Sure, Lakhri was probably not going to chew her out over a few minutes, but truth be told, Eeth's inability to tolerate her penchant for tardiness had started to sink in. "Heya, Lakhri. That must be some novel," she commented tiredly, slumping into the couch adjacent and flopping backwards. It appeared that the man had not moved since she left as he was still sitting in the same chair with his head buried in that same datapad.

"Hmm," murmured Lakhri indistinctly, engrossed in the ultimate showdown between the main protagonist and his long-lost parents who turned out to be at the head of a rather big conspiracy. "It's quite gripping." He finished reading the paragraph and looked up. "Hiya," he said. "You look tired. Are you up to an evening meditation or do you just want to go to sleep right away?

"Can I just sleep, please? I'm tired." Raven was well aware that it was barely eight-thirty in the evening, which was a testament to how much this virus had knocked her around. She rolled onto her side, a leg flopping over the edge of the couch. "Or maybe I can watch some holo until I fall asleep? I'll get my blanket." It was a long shot, but Raven was willing to try it. Besides, she always found Lakhri's presence soothing and liked to be around him.

"Not if you're too tired to do meditation," said Lakhri gently. "In that case, you had better head straight for bed before you fall asleep on the couch."

"Aw. Is that your final decision?" Raven hedged. Because, well, you had to be in it to win it.

"If it wasn't my final decision, I wouldn't have said it," Lakhri said a little more firmly. He might be a lot more easy-going than Eeth but he was no pushover.

Raven blew out a sigh. "Spoilsport. Alright, then," she acquiesced, rolling off the couch onto the floor and getting to her feet. "Night, Lakhri," said Raven, and went to get ready for bed.

* * *

The following day, Raven felt a bit better. It was a welcome trend, as was the fact that eating seemed that little bit easier with each meal she managed to keep down. Today it was cereal with fruit and cream. "What do you have on today?" the padawan asked conversationally while doing her padawans' braid.

"I'm back to teaching in the mornings, now that you resumed your classes," said Lakhri. "Today, it's levitation with a group of senior initiates. If I'm not back when you come home, feel free to order some lunch for both of us. I shouldn't keep you waiting for long."

"Sounds like fun. Better than remedial maths, anyway." Today's line-up was slightly different from the previous day, yet she still had to put up with Vantachi. Well, there wasn't a lot that could be done about that, and so she left their quarters that morning without complaint, despite not looking forward to the lesson.

As it turned out, there was a free period after her remedial maths class that day, and Raven couldn't have been happier. It was a bit embarrassing filing out of the classroom with only a few other students, and so Raven tried to be discreet about it, as did the others. Nobody liked the fact that they were repeating this class, after all.

Unfortunately for Raven, Kazim was in that class, a Zabrak who had been friends with Rayan in creche - and they came upon none other than Rayan as they headed towards the central courtyard of that corridor.

"Kazim!" Rayan exclaimed, studiously ignoring Raven. "Good to see you! Where are you headed?"

"Bocce class," said Kazim, stopping to talk to Rayan. "You?"

"I just had physics," said Rayan. "Now I've got a free period because it seems as if the Basic teacher is sick."

"Lucky you," said Kazim. "I just had an hour of remedial maths from hell. Beware of Master Vantachi, he's awful."

"Remedial maths?" asked Rayan in surprise, his eyes flickering towards Raven's retreating back. "Really? What did you do to be put in there?"

"Well, I failed the exam, obviously," said Kazim with a shrug. As a matter of fact, he suffered from a learning disorder and was used to remedial classes; he had long ago stopped being embarrassed about it.

"Anyway," he said, "I gotta go. See you later, I suppose."

"Yeah, see you," said Rayan absent-mindedly as he was still processing this information. He turned and headed after the other students who had a free period now.

Raven had spotted Rayan before he'd stopped and detoured to avoid him. Two reasons: Firstly because she wanted to avoid another shit-slinging match, and secondly… Well, seeing her leaving a remedial class would make him privy to the fact that she'd failed the first one, and provide him with ammunition. Yeah, if it was at all possible, she wanted to avoid that. Thus, Raven headed directly for the padawans' lounge where she planned to hang out until the next period.

Unfortunately for Raven, it took Rayan less than a minute to show up there as well. Well, what a way to ruin a perfectly good free period; it would seem that luck was not with her today.


	9. Chapter 9

A/N: This is an updated version of chapter nine because we completely messed up the timeline in the first version. Sorry. ;)

* * *

"Stop!" thundered the Bothan Jedi master. "Put down your saber. Now."

Raven froze at the voice, eyes wide, and deactivated her saber. She didn't know who had given that order, but whoever it was did so in a fashion that was remarkably Eeth-like. She looked down at the disignited lightsaber in her hands and realised how bad this looked. Her eyes shifted left to see who had busted them, but her focus remained on Rayan just in case he tried to pull the same shit as last time; he wasn't getting the jump on her twice. Not happening.

"I wasn't doing anything!" said Rayan hastily. "She just…"

"Silence," snapped the Bothan, his command causing Raven to straighten from a fighting stance and face him. "I will leave it to your masters to find out who did what here. Whatever the case, you know perfectly well that it is unacceptable to draw your saber on another padawan." This was said to Raven. "Who is your master?" the Bothan, a Jedi master by the name of Kovan Kahl, inquired. He had only dropped by the padawans' lounge to pick up his padawan for a training session but since he had come upon this unpleasant scene, he had no choice but to deal with it.

Who was her master? Raven thought wildly. Fuck: someone who was going to kill her, that was who. Well, not immediately, but eventually the shit was going to hit the fan. Raven paled as she recalled the consequences Eeth had imposed for fighting the last time. Okay, so this time she had just been trying to scare Rayan, but still, it looked really bad and she doubted her master was going to see it in quite the same light. Swallowing, Raven lifted her chin and met the Bothan with what she hoped was a brave expression. "Eeth Koth." The words were strained, and anyone who knew of Eeth would know why.

Kovan Kahl frowned which, in a Bothan, looked quite ominous. "Eeth Koth is in the healers' wing, as we all know," he said. "Who is taking care of you?"

Raven and intimidation had met and as such, she was rather difficult to rattle. Still, this was not ideal. No, wait, 'not ideal' was when you accidentally put the wrong sauce on your fries. This was a multi-vehicle speeder wreck, comparatively speaking! She cleared her throat and said curtly, "Lakhri Tumuel."

Kovan nodded equally curtly. "And your master?" he asked Rayan, turning on him.

"Master Tian Barada," he said as politely as he could. "But I wasn't really–"

"Yes, I will leave that for Master Barada to decide, as I believe I already told you," snapped Kovan. "Both of you, be silent and wait. I will call Knight Tumuel and Master Barada and ask them to get to the bottom of this."

And that was what he did. The call reached Lakhri when he was busy preparing a light Senchi soup for lunch that he knew Raven liked. With a sigh, he turned off the stove and went to take the call.

"Knight Tumuel," said Kovan. "We have a problem here in the padawans' lounge. I have to ask you to come and pick up your former master's padawan."

Whatever Raven had done, Lakhri found this quite annoying. But of course, he was trained not to show such things. Thus, he merely said, "I will. Expect me in five minutes." Only when he had terminated the call did he allow himself to roll his eyes.

While Kovan was contacting Lakhri, Raven was doing her best to keep from throttling Rayan. The only reason she wasn't tearing him a new one right now was because they'd been ordered silent. Why she hadn't simply ignored his provocation was beyond her, but she hadn't and now there was going to be trouble, serious trouble. The only saving grace was that, as Kovan had pointed out, Eeth was currently holed up in the healers wing; that would spare her his wrath, at least in the short term. Her face scrunched. Yeah, Lakhri wasn't going to be thrilled over this either but she doubted he would pull out the cane. Force, Raven hoped she was right about that because, and despite recent behaviour to the contrary, she really would do just about anything to avoid that punishment.

A few minutes later, a dark-skinned, broad-shouldered human Jedi, about sixty years of age, entered his room. His long, grey, curly hair was pulled into a knot and although he was not particularly tall, his presence was rather imposing. Rayan seemed to shrink a little as he saw him.

"She drew her saber on me!" he said immediately. "She–"

"I have no interest in discussing the behaviour of another padawan with you," said Master Barada in a slow, deep voice. "I am rather more interested in hearing about your part in the altercation Master Kahl called me about. Or are you claiming that you suffered an unprovoked attack?"

Rayan hesitated. He would really like to say yes but nor did he want to lie to his master; not only would the man find out anyway but Rayan also truly felt that this would go against his honor.

"I see," said Master Barada.

"Well, I don't, so I need an explanation," said Lakhri who came walking up to the scene as fast as his short legs could carry him, taking in the sheepish looks on both padawans' faces and the stern look on the Bothan master's. "Care to give me one, Raven?"

Raven had remained silent, posture stiff and an uncomfortable expression on her face up until that point. Would she care to explain? Heck, no, yet being evasive with Lakhri had never worked in the past. Thus, she met his eye and did her best not to squirm under their collective scrutiny. "I let him provoke me," Raven admitted, "and instead of walking away or going for help, I decided to try intimidating him instead. So, yes," she looked at Barada now, "I did pull my lightsaber on him. I wasn't planning on using it. Although I know that's no excuse." The latter was tacked on rather quickly upon hearing Lakhri clear his throat, and for the first time since this started, Raven dropped her gaze to the floor.

"And how," asked Master Barada, neither his face nor his voice betraying any emotion, "did you provoke her, padawan?"

"Well, uh," Rayan said uncomfortably, "I, uh, just said things. You know. Just words."

"What kind of words?" Lakhri demanded to know. It was going to be up to him to call Raven to task for her rather inappropriate behaviour, after all, so he thought he had better find out how badly, exactly, she had been provoked. Or otherwise. Not that Eeth had ever cared much about how badly he himself had been provoked when he had lost his shit over the other padawans' taunting, Lakhri thought ruefully.

Rayan frowned at him. "Just words," he repeated and added stupidly, "and I'm answering to my master, not you."

Master Barada fetched him a clip round the ear. "You will treat your superiors with respect," he said in his slow, calm, authoritative voice. "All of them. Is that clear?"

Rayan cringed. "Yes, master," he whispered, his face burning with embarrassment.

"Then tell us what you said," said Lakhri.

Now, this was something Rayan was not at all keen on, and it showed. "Well, I, err, kind of indicated that Raven might not be, you know, the best at everything, like– well, she obviously thinks she is! I mean, with Eeth Koth as her master and all. But she's in remedial maths, and I might have mentioned that, and… Well."

Lakhri raised his eyebrows. "Was that really all he said to you?" he said, turning to Raven. "He taunted you for being put in remedial maths, and you drew your saber?" He could not quite imagine that this was all there was to it. But then, Raven had been very ill, she was still in a fragile emotional state, and she did have a temper at the best of times.

Okay, so Raven would be lying if she said seeing Rayan embarrassed by his master had not been satisfying on some level. It totally had. The sentiment was short-lived, however, when he stopped talking. Raven turned to Lakhri, a slight look of panic on her face. "No, Lakhri," Raven said quickly, hands raised in placation. "He said a whole lot more than that. Mostly it was stuff about Eeth and how I'm not worthy of being his padawan. But also about how I couldn't fight my way out of a wet paper bag." Raven had the prudence to look a little sheepish at this point, yet straightened quickly enough. "It's nothing he hasn't said to me before, but he wouldn't stop or go away." She glared at Rayan briefly, reminded of the last time they had fought like this and what had caused it. Granted, Raven could have left the padawans' lounge and avoided a repeat occurrence, which she was certain Eeth would have pointed out. But, well, Rayan had managed to piss her off enough that she hadn't been thinking straight.

Master Barada looked at Rayan. "Is that true?" he asked, his voice impassive, but it would not exactly have needed a genius to see that he was less than pleased.

"Well," said Rayan, squirming. "You know…"

"No, I don't," said Master Barada. "I asked you a question and I want you to answer it. Did you say these things in order to provoke your fellow padawan, yes or no?"

"I suppose I did," Rayan mumbled, his cheeks flushing an even deeper red. He knew he was in for it. What was worse, his master was sure to be disappointed in him and Rayan found that hard to deal with. It was probably mostly for that reason that he quickly added, "Sorry, Raven. I shouldn't have said those things."

"No, you aren't," Raven snorted, the reaction out before she had time to contemplate how smart it was to openly call someone's apology out as bullshit, even if it was ingenuine in her opinion. And Raven really didn't believe that Rayan was sorry for anything he had said to her. More likely he was sorry for getting himself into trouble with his new master. Well, if he expected an apology in kind, he was sorely mistaken. Raven wasn't sorry for standing up to him, she was just regretful over the way she had gone about it.

Rayan looked up at her indignantly, his eyes flashing. Before he could say anything, however, Lakhri did. "That was not the wisest thing to say," he informed Raven, his voice heavy with disapproval. "I think before you dig yourself in any deeper, we will take this to our quarters. I have heard enough. Or do you have any more questions?" The last bit was said to Master Barada.

"No," said Barada. "We will return to our quarters as well. Thank you, Master Kahl."

Master Kahl bowed and left to finally find his padawan who was, of course, by now part of a small group of gawking onlookers. Fortunately for Raven and Rayan, the lounge was not exactly crowded at this time of the day.

"Raven might be in touch with you later," said Lakhri to Master Barada because he was fairly certain that Eeth would order Raven to apologise properly.

It was all Raven could do not to veto Lakhri's statement. She wisely refrained, though, for several reasons. Firstly, she could tell he didn't approve of her response. Secondly, she didn't want to give the crowd of onlookers anything else to gawk at, and finally, well, it would just make everything a whole lot worse; besides, Raven wouldn't embarrass Lakhri by publicly defying him. Resigned, the padawan turned and followed Lakhri from the lounge, arms folded about her chest and staring at the floor.

"I'm sorry, Lakhri," she said after they entered the turbo lift where she was sure that they were out of earshot. It was hard to say what exactly she was apologising for, but it was sincere. Raven hadn't meant to cause him trouble any more than she had thought Rayan would get the better of her.

"What for?" said Lakhri curtly. He was not overly pleased at having to deal with this, and what was more, he suspected that Raven was not at all sorry for the things she ought to be sorry for.

"For letting Rayan get to me, and…" She glanced sideways to gauge his expression; not that it was hard to tell from his tone that he was pissed. "…for the fact that you had to come to the lounge and get me."

"Oh, please," said Lakhri. "That's part of my job description and it's not what you're in trouble for at all. Letting him get to you is also not what you're in trouble for. You're in trouble for drawing your saber on him, and you know that's simply a no-go. What did you think that would accomplish? Were you hoping to engage him in a saber fight in the padawans' lounge?"

"No. I wasn't planning on letting it get that far." For one thing Raven was still in no condition to put up a decent fight, but she left that out for now. "I was trying to intimidate him, and maybe to prove that I wasn't as pathetic as he was making out. I know, I get it, I shouldn't have pulled my saber. But…" Raven sighed. "He just pissed me off. He always manages to get under my skin."

"Obviously," said Lakhri, stepping out of the lift and into the corridor that held Eeth's and Raven's quarters. "And what would you have done if he had drawn his saber, too? That might not have been what you were planning but then, you weren't the only party involved here."

"I dunno. Probably tried to bluff my way out of it. I might not be as good at classwork as he is, but I'm usually better when it comes to a saber fight. He might have backed down." Raven started to slow down, the day's events catching up on her. Yeah, better when she wasn't recovering from the Neimoidian virus from hell.

"Or he might not," said Lakhri cuttingly, palming open the doors to their quarters. "Which is exactly why you don't get to draw your saber on anyone unless it's in defense. Whatever the provocation is, you simply don't do it."

He pulled off his boots and flung them into the corner with a little more gusto than strictly necessary.

"Pull off your boots and sit on the couch," he said.

Raven didn't need telling twice. She collapsed into the couch and pulled first one foot up, and then the other, sending her boots flying to join Lakhri's, if with less gusto. She hated that he was displeased with her, but then, it wasn't like Raven could blame him. Thus, she just sat there hoping that some words to make up for it would come to her. They did not.

Lakhri went to the terminal and wrote a short message, excusing Raven from the last class of the day. Then he sat opposite her, ran his hand through his curls and thought for a moment.

"So, how are you feeling physically?" he finally asked. "Are you exhausted? Any aches and pains?" He thought he needed to know this before he decided on how to proceed from here.

Okay, so Raven didn't like the sound of that any more than she liked the expression on his face. She pulled her legs up into her chest and curled her arms around her knees protectively. Her guilt was probably obvious, but how did she feel physically? "Tired," came the cautious reply. Raven wasn't exactly sure, but despite feeling bad for what had happened, she wasn't keen on enduring potential repercussions.

Well, that was helpful, thought Lakhri. "What I meant," he said, "is this: if I punished you, would you be able to endure it or would you collapse on the spot?"

"If I say the latter, will you let me take a nap instead?" It was an expected response to such a question, Raven thought. Besides, even an unnecessary nap would be preferable to having her ass handed to her.

"Whatever I'd do, I would certainly not dispense with punishing you," said Lakhri. "And you don't get to reply to a question with a counterquestion. Not when you're in so much trouble. So, are you really too exhausted or do you merely not want me to punish you?"

"I don't want you to punish me," Raven admitted, letting her forehead thunk onto her knees. Raven was many things, but a coward was not one of them. It also didn't help that she suspected Lakhri was put out by having to do this in the first place, and making it harder for him wasn't really fair, as much as she didn't want the outcome. And Raven did absolutely not want whatever he had in mind, as she doubted it would include writing lines, essays or the like if he was enquiring after her physical condition.

"Yeah, well, if I wanted you to like this, I'd hand out ice cream," said Lakhri a tad wearily. He pondered his options briefly. Then he rose, made his way to the dining table and pulled out a chair.

"Come here," he said, "and tell me what this punishment is for." It was not as if he was going to enjoy doing this so he might as well get it over with quickly. Unfortunately for Raven, he had been in this situation far too often, for the exact same type of offense, to have any doubt about what he might need to do.

Raven blew out a sigh and reluctantly dragged herself from her spot on the couch. She wasn't happy about any of this, yet neither could she exactly blame Lakhri for whatever he planned on doing. Thus, Raven stood by the chair, folded her arms and tried not to look like she was sulking.

Lakhri raised his eyebrows. He was tempted to say "I do not like repeating myself, padawan" in an Eeth-kind-of-voice but making light of the situation was probably not warranted. Instead, he said firmly, "You're not exactly making this easier on yourself, Raven. What is this punishment for?"

Why the adults in her life felt it necessary to make her restate the stupidity that lead to punishment, Raven did not know. Well, actually she did know, but the fact that she had already been told why once and was forced to repeat it was hard on her pride. It made her feel like a youngling. Her face scrunched and she tightened the grip on her arms. "Because I drew my lightsaber on Rayan," she said in resignation.

"And," Lakhri asked mercilessly, "what should you have done instead?"

The look Raven gave him now was pained, yet she refrained from complaining about it. Just. "Walked away," she replied, the response coming out strained. Raven stopped short of adding in the alternative, which was to go find a superior Jedi because, well, she wasn't exactly sure if that was really an option when you were a padawan.

"Exactly," said Lakhri grimly. "And you will grant me that this is not just a case of a grown-up telling you stuff he has no clue about. I spent a lot of my time as an initiate and a fair share of my early padawanhood being teased by others who were taller than me, and I was constantly trying to get my own back. Eeth cured me of that habit the hard way, and over time I realised that he has done me a favor. Indulging these feelings and acting on them is nothing but a way to the Dark Side, however harmless it seems at the moment. I care too much about you to let you get away with this. And that is why you are going to be punished. Bare your bottom and bend over the chair."

As he said this, he started opening the clasp of his belt.

"Lakhri, you don't have to do this. Honest. Eeth is going to be super pissed when he finds out." She gave him a meaningful look. "And you know what he's likely to pull out as soon as he can do so without puking." Still, she started unbuckling her belt and trousers because although Lakhri was harder to push to the point, once he decided on punishment, he tended to react badly to arguments.

"He'll most definitely be 'super pissed'," said Lakhri, "but I'm fairly sure he won't want to add any physical punishment to what I'm going to deal out now. Now get into position." Eeth might, of course, add other punishments to the belting Raven was going to receive, and Lakhri had a fairly clear idea what those were going to be, but Raven could find that out for herself. For now, Lakhri focussed on pulling out his belt, doubling it over and taking up a position that would allow him a good aim.

Okay, so the fact that Lakhri was planning on making this ass-kicking so epic that Eeth wouldn't add to it was sobering. Once Raven's belt was undone, her pants fell of their own volition; she had not yet regained all of the weight she'd lost thanks to the virus and her clothes were still a bit looser than usual. "Lakhriiii, I've been sick," she tried as she turned and folded herself over the chair's backrest. It was a bit cowardly of her, she knew that, but, well, Force! Sometimes it was every padawan for themselves.

"Raven, we've been through this," snapped Lakhri. "You admitted you were well enough to take this punishment, and now that it's imminent, you want to plead your way out of it. You may as well save yourself the effort because it won't work. You were way out of line and you deserve this. Rather than trying to avoid it, you should focus on learning from it."

Without losing any further time, he raised the belt and brought it down on Raven's bottom. He had used his belt on particularly unruly students a couple of times but those had been younger and he had held back accordingly. With Raven, he held back as well, but a lot less so; she was a padawan, after all, and hers had been a serious offense.

Any reply that Raven might have uttered was cut off when Lakhri branded her ass with that belt. It practically took her breath away. It fucking hurt, it really did, and as the next few landed, it took considerable willpower to stay in position. Granted, this was not as bad as the cane; Force, nothing in Raven's experience rivaled that. Still, this was far from easy to deal with. By the fourth she was squirming, by the fifth she let out a gasp and by six that gasp had morphed into a yeowl.

Lakhri decided to use the Force to restrain Raven because it might be hard for her to maintain her position otherwise. Then he continued, dealing out stroke after stroke. Unlike Eeth, who was very methodical that way, he did not have a fixed number of strokes in mind; he was more interested in getting his message across and was going to stop only when he was sure he had done so.

By the time Lakhri nailed her ass for the twelth time, Raven had started sweating from the pain. It hadn't been easy but she had managed to take her licks without completely losing her shit. Sure, tears were in her eyes and rolling down her cheeks but she had made it! The problem was that when Raven went to stand, she found that it was still difficult to move. And then it dawned on her; Fuck, what if he wasn't stopping at twelve? Eeth usually stopped at TWELVE! "Yeoow!" Raven howled as another solid whack scorched her ass. He wasn't stopping! "Lakhri, I'm sorry!" She wailed, and started to really cry because now shit was truly trumps.

"Good," said Lakhri and still dealt out the fourteenth swat. He was not going to give her much more but he felt that she should not be allowed to tough it out, which was so much easier to do when there was a fixed number of strokes to expect. With this in mind, he let another one follow.

With this Raven let out a screech, her hips twisted and she tried to stand. It didn't work, of course, because Lakhri was stopping her from getting up. Yet if her desperation wasn't clear enough by her actions, it was certainly clear in the volume of her wails and crying, both of which increased exponentially as he nailed her ass with that horrid thing again.

Lakhri gave her one last lick, right on the crease where her bottom met her thighs, and then stopped. "Alright, it's over," he said. It had not been easy for him at all to deal out such a harsh punishment, but it helped that throughout it, he had been absolutely convinced that this was the right thing to do. And he knew Eeth well enough to assume that other consequences were likely to follow.

Still howling, Raven sprang up from the chair, dragged a sleeve across her face to hide it and began flapping the back of her tunic in an effort at fanning some cool air onto her ass. It didn't work, yet the effort was at least momentarily distracting her from the fire that raged there! She didn't look at Lakhri. It wasn't because she blamed him, it was more that the pain tended to override her sense of fairplay and logic, making it hard for her to immediately forgive someone who had just caused her so much discomfort. On purpose!

Lakhri knew all about the resentment and he also knew what was needed on such occasions. As such, he had a handkerchief ready. He also pulled Raven into a hug, rubbing comforting circles on her back. A bit more growth on her side, and this was going to become awkward, but for now, he was only marginally smaller than she was.

As was typical with Raven, the moment Lakhri pulled her into a hug, the resentment began melting away. Her tears, however, now came full force, and she cried into his tunic. After a minute or so, she managed to pull herself together enough to stand and face him. "I-I'm s-sorry, Lakhri," she hiccupped, swiping at her face with the handkerchief while trying to pull up her pants at the same time. She was doing her best to stop sniffling. After all, Raven was Eeth's padawan and there was just something wrong about falling apart over punishment, especially in front of his former apprentice.

"Apology accepted," Lakhri said gently. "Now I would like you to meditate for half an hour on why you just received such a harsh punishment and what you are going to do to avoid a repeat occurrence." He knew that this was exactly what Eeth would have imposed, for good reason; the punishment would serve no purpose unless it brought about some insights.

Raven gave him a watery, pained kind of look that silently begged him not to emulate Eeth in this aspect!

"Nope, sorry, not negotiable," said Lakhri, steeling himself against that look. It had not been entirely unexpected anyway.

Resigned, Raven went to her mat. She wasn't sitting, that was for sure, so she knelt and thunked her head into the wall. It wasn't easy, and unlike when Eeth set her this task, Raven didn't try much of an effort to control her wriggling, fidgeting and writhing, which actually made it harder to concentrate.

Lakhri could understand that Raven had a hard time concentrating. Still, he had given her an instruction and so far, she was not doing a very good job following it.

"How about you try to focus," he said. "More specifically, focus on what you're going to tell your master when you see him later. He'll be sure to ask the exact questions I told you to meditate on, and you'd probably be well-advised to be able to offer a satisfactory reply."

Raven's head spun around at hearing Lakhri speak. Honestly, she had not thought of what Eeth would have to say about all of this! It drew a groan, and again, her head thunked into the wall; Eeth was going to murder her.

The rest of the meditation went about as well as Lakhri thought he had any right to expect, given the circumstances.

"Alright, you can stop now," he finally told Raven, his tone of voice kind. He reached out to help her up and pulled her into another brief hug. "Let's consider this incident closed, alright?" he said. "I mean… between you and me. Eeth is a different matter. But as far as I'm concerned, you've been punished enough."

"I don't suppose you would consider trying to convince Eeth that you were hard enough on me that his job has been done?" Raven replied. She had considered herself punished enough after the sixth whack, after all! The problem with that was Eeth probably wouldn't see it that way.

Lakhri shrugged. "I'll tell him exactly how hard I was on you and leave it to him to decide what's enough and what isn't," he said. "He's your master, after all. Would you like some bacta now? You know I'm crap at Force-aided healing, but bacta usually does a good enough job."

Raven dragged a hand down her face at receiving that response. It wasn't that she hadn't half expected it. Still, there had been hope that Lakhri might just be her ardent champion. She did want that bacta, though, which was why Raven didn't complain or comment further. "How do you want me?" she asked.

"Pull down your pants and lie on the couch," said Lakhri matter-of-factly.

When she had complied, he knelt next to her and examined her bottom, flinching slightly at the thorough work he had done. Yes, bacta was definitely in order. He started to spread it very gently across the crisscrossing welts. While he worked, he said: "As you might have gathered, I expect you to own up to Eeth when we visit him later."

"I know," Raven mumbled into the crook of her elbow. She was feeling a little sorry for herself, although the bacta was at least taking the edge off the fire. It stung at first, but once the initial discomfort subsided, it was usually clear sailing from there. Raven tried to imagine how Eeth was going to react. He would be displeased, disappointed, maybe even a bit angry given that this wasn't the first time she had gotten into this sort of trouble, and it had even been with the same antagonist! Would that make it better or worse? Raven wasn't sure. "In your experience, how bad do you think he's going to react?" she asked, turning her head to the side so she could gauge Lakhri'is expression.

Lakhri sighed. He was under no illusion as to how thrilled Eeth was going to be when he heard of this episode.

"Just wait and see," he merely said, however, because, well, it was possible that the virus had softened Eeth… Possible, but not likely, he had to concede.

"Incidentally," Lakhri continued in order to change the topic, "how are you feeling physically, your bottom aside? Are you holding up?"

"I'm okay. Although I'd be a lot better if you'd tell me how badly you think the shit is going to hit the fan." Raven managed to give him a lopsided smile.

"Hey, I'm not channeling Eeth, you know," said Lakhri, returning the smile. "Nor do I possess the gift of foresight. Come on, let's have some lunch."

Raven didn't comment on his lack of foresight. Instead, she busied herself fanning the bacta dry with the back of her tunic while Lakhri went back to the kitchen.

"Could you set the table?" Lakhri called.

"Alright," replied Raven. "Although just so you know, I'd rather throw myself on my saber than eat right now."

"Ah, c'mon, I made one of your favourites," said Lakhri. "I even cooked it myself." He was not the most enthusiastic of cooks but thanks to Eeth, he was well able to put a decent meal together.

"Come on, I know you like to eat this," he said, showing her the pot of Senchi broth with thinly sliced vegetables and tofu as she entered the kitchen. "I'm not going to take you to the healers' wing on an empty stomach, or they might bite my head off. Unless Eeth does it first."

Raven had to chuckle at that. "I'll eat it, I just don't want to is all," she said and sighed at the food. She really did appreciate the time he was taking to make things that were to her taste; he didn't have to do that at all, but he was. She helped him set the table and served herself an acceptable amount so as to keep them both off everyone's shit list.

"Thanks, Lakhri. Not for kicking my ass into next week, I could have done without that part, but for making nice stuff for me to eat and being there for us." The last week had been particularly tough on her, and Lakhri's presence had helped.

"You're welcome," said Lakhri kindly. "Of course I was there for you. Both of you are important to me, after all." He smiled at Raven and started tucking into his soup.

"Hey, you know, I was thinking," said Raven. "Maybe it's not such a good idea telling Eeth about the whole Rayan thing just yet. I mean, what if he relapses? It might not be good for him." It was actually true, although Raven had more than one motive here.

Lakhri snorted derisively. "Yeah, right," he retorted. "And what if he blows a gasket tomorrow because you didn't tell him right away?"

"That's a risk I'm willing to take. Especially when It's for his own good."

"Oh, come on," said Lakhri, "it isn't as if he won't notice that something's wrong the moment you enter his room. How likely is it that Eeth, of all people, will let you keep this from him any longer than strictly necessary? – Not that I would allow you to keep it from him anyway," he added on as an afterthought.

"What if I go to see him and he doesn't notice? Then I could not say anything. But if he does notice, I'll confess?" Raven hedged, pointing her spoon at Lakhri and hoping to find some loophole around his tell-all edict.

"You," said Lakhri sternly, "will confess of your own accord, like the young Jedi you are. If you wait for him to drag it out of you, neither of us will be happy with you."

Raven forbore to reiterate that this was for Eeth's own good here, if only because, well, she was also trying to put off the conversation and subsequent repercussions that were likely to come from said conversation. Also, she didn't want to piss off Lakhri either. He had been good to her and she didn't exactly want to repay him by being difficult. "Alright then, but just so you know, if he relapses, I'm going to say I told you so."

"Yes, feel free to do so," said Lakhri good-naturedly. They spoke for a while longer until Raven started paddling in what was left. "Are you finished with your soup?" asked Lakhri.

Raven nodded, glad to have eaten enough to pass muster.

"Then let's get going," said Lakhri.

"If we must," came Raven's unenthusiastic response. She took her time helping him clear the table but all the stalling in the universe wasn't going to stop Lakhri from practically dragging her out the door. This was going to be a difficult conversation and one the padawan was not at all looking forward to.


	10. Chapter 10

"Padawan. Lakhri," said Eeth in a low voice as he sensed his former and his current padawan enter the room. He opened his eyes and gave them a small smile. He was pleased to see them but he had to be careful not to talk too much or too loudly, else he would have another coughing fit. Raven, on the other hand, was looking a little healthier with every day that passed. That said, she seemed a tad apprehensive, possibly even guilty, about something. Well, Eeth had no doubt that he would hear about it before the visit was over.

"Master." Raven greeted him with a bow and sat carefully on his bedside so as not to jostle him. "How are you feeling? Any better?" He had lost a lot of weight also and looked drawn, but at least he had some of his colour back today.

"A little," said Eeth quietly. "The cough is slow to recede, but my general physical condition seems to be improving." He decided against telling her that he was still not able to get up on his own – at least not without being brought to his knees by a coughing fit.

"How about you?" he asked. "Is Lakhri taking good care of you? Do you eat enough?"

Raven eyed Eeth skeptically, but took him at his word. He did seem a better colour today, after all. "I'm okay. The thought of food still makes me sick, but I haven't puked since leaving the healers' wing. Besides, Lakhri is making all my favourite things which is making it easier."

At this point, Lakhri gave a polite cough. He rather wanted to get the inevitable over with, and he was also a little dubious as to how much small-talk Eeth was able to tolerate today. He did seem healthier but also rather tired, which was probably due to the cough. The healers had told him to expect as much.

"I think," he said, "there was something you wanted to tell your master, other than what a great cook I am. Not that I mind him hearing that."

Eeth's eyebrows rose. "Is that so?" he asked, not altogether surprised. "Well then, out with it."

Raven shot Lakhri a 'you tratoir' kind of look. Sure, it wasn't his fault, but it felt good nonetheless. Sighing, Raven scrunched up her face and met Eeth with a concerned expression. "I am worried that you'll relapse. Can I tell you when you're better? Please?"

"I am well able to listen," Eeth said, "even though talking is risky. If you have my health in mind, just tell me and stop forcing me to ask questions or give additional orders."

Raven dragged a hand down her face; she seemed to be doing that a lot lately. That Eeth kinda had a point did nothing for her ulterior motive here either. "Fine," she sighed into her hand. "You remember Rayan from your initiates' saber class?" It wasn't really a question because how could he forget the initiate who broke her arm and with whom she had gotten into a massive fight within her first few months as his apprentice? Thus, Raven continued without waiting for verbal confirmation. "I don't know if you know this but some crazy person took him on as a padawan, so yeah, now he's in my Basic class. Yay for me. The first words he said to me were about how you'd be happy to get a break from me, insinuating that you'd choose death over my company, and it got worse as the days went on." Raven explained how they had ended up in the padawans' lounge during their free period today, and how he had ridiculed her for being in remedial maths, for being unworthy as Eeth's apprentice. "He said the Force was broken if it put me with you, and then, he started on about how I'm rubbish at everything and shouldn't even be a padawan. I'm not rubbish at everything! The podracer crash, lack of energy and concentration on Borleias was because this stupid virus was affecting my ability to use the Force." Raven felt obligated to defend herself, even though it wasn't what Rayan had said and Eeth had never questioned it. "I lost my temper with him. I wasn't planning on fighting him, I mean, I'm in no condition to do that, but Rayan knows I can beat him. I thought maybe he might back down and so I drew my saber on him."

"I see," said Eeth neutrally and paused, waiting to hear whether more would follow, such as "I know it was wrong and I will not do this again."

When Eeth said nothing more, and the silence started to become uncomfortable, Raven felt compelled to continue. "I'm sorry, master. Please don't be angry with me. Lakhri already kicked my ass for it, so you needn't worry about that, and I know it wasn't the right thing to do."

"Well, I did, so to say, kick her ass," Lakhri affirmed; he was by now nearly feeling sorry for Raven as Eeth seemed to have regained the ability to fix her with his patented glare. "I gave her sixteen strokes with my belt, and I didn't go easy on her." He felt a bit awkward about providing the details of this punishment in front of Raven but he thought that it was in her best interest. Eeth needed to know that she had been adequately punished.

True to Lakhri's assumption, Eeth said promptly, "That was a well-deserved punishment if ever there was one. Padawan, I am not angry, but I am appalled; appalled that you would even consider drawing your saber on a fellow padawan, no matter what the provocation was. You are carrying a real lightsaber: a formidable weapon of defence, but also a weapon that can kill. Carrying such a weapon entails a big responsibility. You have not lived up to that responsibility, and as such, you have forfeited the right to carry your weapon for the time being."

He held out his hand, the expression on his face brooking no objection.

The shame was overwhelming. By the time Eeth had finished, Raven's head was lowered so much that her chin almost touched her chest. The confiscation of a padawan's lightsaber was a rare punishment that was considered rather harsh by Temple standards, mostly because it was so obvious to everyone! It had also only ever happened to Raven once before, and that had been for the particularly reckless and irresponsible decision to allow herself to become intoxicated by deathsticks on their return from Larivan. That had felt like the most horrifying month of her life. Still, what could she do about it? Arguing with him over it, even if he weren't practically on his deathbed, would still be suicidal. Sniffling, the padawan tried to swallow the watermelon-sized lump that was currently choking her long enough to attempt a plea, but it wasn't happening: if she opened her mouth, she would cry. Therefore, Raven unclipped her lightsaber and reluctantly put it in Eeth's hand.

"Thank you, padawan," Eeth said, his voice slightly softer now. "I want you to –" Before he could complete the sentence, he was racked by the kind of coughing fit that reliably happened when he talked too much these days; it was long and rather painful. Raven did her best to comfort him, but ended up having to move from his bedside lest she be bounced off from the ferocity behind his hacking. When it was finally over, Eeth took a sip of water from a glass that Lakhri had fetched, leaned back into his pillow, closed his eyes and cleared his throat several times before he was able to continue speaking. "I want you to apologise to Rayan in person," he finally croaked. "Today. When you have done so, come and see me again."

It was clear that he was running out of energy. Lakhri quickly placed a comforting hand on Eeth's shoulder and said: "I will make sure she does. Get some rest now. We will be back later." Without opening his eyes, Eeth nodded.

The last thing Raven would do was argue anything Eeth said right now because that had sounded painful, really painful. She leaned over and sent a surge of energy across their bond, hoping that it would help him, and then left with Lakhri as a healer entered to help make Eeth more comfortable.

"I'm so not apologising over this," Raven vented as they walked down the corridor towards the turbolifts.

"Oh?" said Lakhri, raising his eyebrows. "And how, exactly, are you planning on getting away with that? I don't think that Eeth's instructions left much to be desired in terms of clarity."

"I know," Raven huffed, feeling frustrated. "I can't get away with it, I just wish there was an alternative. Maybe we don't have to do it right away, though." She looked at him hopefully: after all, this turbolift could take them to a number of places.

"Yes, we do," said Lakhri. "I looked up where they live and it's where we're going. Better to get it over with." He knew what Raven felt like. More than once, Eeth had made him apologise to jerks who had made fun of him, and he had resented it. He also knew he had deserved it.

Raven sighed, again. This was not what she had in mind! Sure, eventually, but did it have to be right now!?

As fate would have it, Rayan and his master lived on the other side of the Temple which gave Raven a bit more time to think on how horrifying this was going to be. She stood in front of their door for a long moment and closed her eyes. It took a prompt from Lakhri before Raven sucked it up and hit the door panel, effectively announcing their presence.

A moment later the door opened to reveal Master Barada. The man was not particularly surprised at seeing Raven and Lakhri; it would stand to reason that either Lakhri or Eeth would have asked Raven to apologise. Still, he felt that she would learn more from this experience if he did not make this too easy for her. Therefore, he merely bowed to both of them and said, "Good afternoon. How may I be of service?"

"Um. Is Rayan here?" She hoped he wouldn't be but suspected that luck was not going to be with her today.

"Yes. Would you like to speak to him?" Barada asked.

"No, not really," Raven answered honestly. "But my master has ordered me to apologise so I guess I kinda have to."

Lakhri rolled his eyes. 'My master has ordered me to apologise,' really! He jabbed his elbow into Raven's side and shot her a frown.

"She absolutely has to," he said, "and she will do so graciously if she knows what's good for her."

Raven covered the slight 'oof' at Lakhri's subtle reminder, and only nodded at his assertion. How graciously she managed this, however, remained to be seen.

Master Barada's mouth twitched. "Very well," he said. "Please come in." He stepped aside to allow the two access to the common room and went to knock on Rayan's door. "Padawan, please come out for a moment!" he called.

Rayan looked towards the door, surprised to sense that there was more than one being on the other side of it. Standing, he left his datapad running and went to see what his master, and the others, wanted. He hoped it wasn't another meeting with the Council. Of course, Rayan hadn't been in serious trouble again since his last fight with Raven, but today he had found himself lapsing into old habits. Jealousy and spitefulness were not traits acceptable for a Jedi apprentice, he knew that, yet something about Raven being apprenticed to Eeth irked him. "Master?" he questioned, and then his gaze locked on Raven and Lakhri.

Seizing the moment of surprise she sensed in Rayan, Raven stepped forward a bit and addressed him. "I'm sorry that I drew my lightsaber on you, Rayan. I shouldn't have done that, despite your provocations." Raven stopped short of asking for his forgiveness because, well, she wasn't told to ask for that, only to give an apology. Which she had done.

Rayan was sorely tempted to throw her apology back in her face as she had done with his earlier. It was no less ingenuine, or so he thought. He didn't, though, if only because he was really trying to make up for his earlier behaviour. Thus, he said, "Okay, thanks. I accept your apology," and looked to his master. Had that been okay? Apparently he needed to improve his ability to get along with others, and he was trying to take his master's teachings seriously.

Master Barada gave him a slight nod. Being an experienced Jedi, he had been asked by the Council to work with the boy and see if padawanhood was an option, despite Rayan's arrogance and aggression. Not only had he felt a connection with Rayan in the Force, he had also seen beneath the haughtiness and boastfulness and found an insecure child who craved recognition and acceptance. He needed a master to thrive, and Barada had given him what he needed. Rayan's behaviour had improved out of sight since he had been under Barada's care, and even more so when he had finally been made a padawan. Of course, there were still lapses; old habits were hard to leave behind. This morning had been one of those lapses, and Barada had addressed it accordingly.

* * *

_Earlier that day…_

The unease Rayan felt only got worse upon hearing his master declare that they, too, would be taking this back to their quarters to discuss. By now he knew Barada well enough to know what such a talk might entail. He had to let go of this jealousy he harboured for Raven. He was a padawan now, just like her, and there was nothing that made her better, not even the fact that Eeth had chosen her over him. This had him feeling guilt towards his master also, as he owed the man so much and wanted to please him with his progress. That he was still working himself up over old gripes grated on him; he should be past this by now. He didn't say anything as they walked slowly towards the other spire; their quarters were quite a distance from the padawans' lounge which, for the first time, he thought was a good thing!

Barada, for his part, did not speak as they made their way back to their quarters. He thought it might do Rayan good to think about his behaviour for some time. The boy was impulsive, but he usually saw sense when given time to cool off. Barada had found that Rayan was very keen on pleasing him and tried hard to avoid any kind of behaviour that might disappoint his master. That had been one of the traits that had convinced Barada to try and take on this responsibility, despite the skepticism that some Council members had felt with regard to Rayan's chances of ever becoming a Jedi. Barada knew that Rayan could change for the better, he just needed sufficient motivation. Well, today he was going to receive some motivation, that much was certain!

Once they had arrived at their quarters, he told Rayan, "Go to your room and meditate. I will be with you in a while. By then, I will expect an exhaustive account of what you did, why it was wrong and what you might do to avoid a repeat occurrence."

The long walk back to their quarters had indeed given Rayan time to think, and it also had his guilt skyrocketing. Thus, he went to his bedroom without a word and immediately sat to meditate. Rayan had never had any problems with meditation. He enjoyed it and happily meditated for hours when his duties permitted. Connecting with the Force in this way helped him see things with a clarity that he often lacked otherwise. Today it brought into sharp focus his feelings of insecurity, fears that his master would wash his hands of him, that the Council might deem him too much hard work. In a way, he had used Raven to vent and take that out on which was not very Jedi-like.

Barada excused Rayan from the last period of the day, much like Lakhri had done, and went to the kitchen to make some sandwiches. He knew that meditation was helpful for Rayan. Some padawans perceived it as a punishment; for Rayan, it was a chance to gain some perspective on his actions.

When the sandwiches were done, Barada placed them in the stasis unit and went to knock on the door to Rayan's room.

"Padawan?" he called. "Please come out to the common room."

Rayan took a moment to rise from his trance. Sometimes he fell so deeply in tune with the Force that he was hard to rouse. Not today. Today he was too focused on all his mistakes to lose himself. When his door slid open, Barada was still standing there and pointed him towards the couch. Rayan went, again without speaking. He tended to internalise a lot, which was probably why he lashed out, he had been told.

Barada sat down opposite Rayan and fixed his padawan with a firm, intense look.

"Alright, what did you do and why was it wrong?" he asked. He was never one to beat around the bush.

Rayan had expected this question, so why was it so hard for him to answer it? "I was picking on Raven, I guess. That wasn't very nice of me. I know you want me to be better than that, and I didn't do that today. I didn't stop and think about why I felt like lashing out at her. I just did it because it was easy and it made me feel better."

"Was there any specific reason that you picked her as a victim?" asked Barada. "Or could it have been anyone?" He knew that the two padawans had a history. He was not quite sure, however, why Raven, specifically, provoked such negative emotions in Rayan. It might be indicative of some deeper issues and he wanted to get to the bottom of those.

That was a question Rayan did not want to answer because it would mean admitting that he felt jealous of Raven, and he didn't want his master to think for one second that he wasn't grateful to be his padawan. The very idea had his stomach churning.

Barada, however, was of course not going to let him get away with refusing to answer. He was also mindful of the shame his padawan seemed to be feeling and he did not think that commands or threats were the way to go here. At least not yet.

"Padawan," he said gently, "there is no shame in your feelings. They are what they are. The important thing is dealing with them appropriately. You need to own up to them in order to be able to let go. If you cannot do that, that would be a reason to feel ashamed. But I know that you are no coward. Rest assured that whatever is behind this, I will not judge you. Now answer my question, please."

This was reassuring. However, it didn't make it any easier for Rayan to confess his deepest fears and such to his master. He wasn't yet at a stage where he was secure in his new role. "You might think me unworthy of your training," he began, prefacing what was sure to make Barada feel disgusted in him. "Raven and I, uh you see… We've never got along, not since our youngest days in creche. She thinks she's so great because of how good her saber skills are, because of her creepy gift to talk to ants and stuff, and because she's so pretty. Everyone likes her and she doesn't even have to try. I–" He sighed and looked like he was experiencing physical discomfort now. "I've always been jealous of her. It got a lot worse when I made it to Eeth Koth's advanced saber class and I thought I was meant to be his padawan. Then he chose Raven." Rayan met his master's gaze, his eyes slightly glassy, but he was not crying. "I don't at all mean that I do not think as highly of you as I do of Eeth. I hate the way it sounds, but there you go." The boy was feeling downright horrid right now because surely his master wasn't going to stand for that bullshit.

That made a lot of sense to Barada and it also explained why he had been so reluctant to talk about it.

"Thank you for telling me," he said kindly. "That required courage. It probably didn't help that Eeth Koth and his padawan have been the talk of the Temple these last days, did it?"

"No, master." This was something Rayan had not mentioned to his master. Why? Because how bad did that look? He had just had his dreams come true and been taken as a padawan, only to start griping about how everyone was gushing over his nemesis from creche. He wasn't that conceited. Or at least he was trying to overcome his shortcomings. He really was.

And Barada knew as much. Still, he needed to help Rayan along, and that included providing incentives to avoid repeat occurrences.

"Padawan," he said, "I know you can do better than you did today. And I know you _want_ to do better. You know perfectly well that it's not the Jedi way to provoke, let alone insult, your fellow padawans. Since you have a hard time living up to that knowledge, I'll give you something to think about the next time temptation arises."

He rose, pulled out a chair from the dining table and sat down.

"Come here," he said.

By this point, Rayan was feeling wretched over his confessions but mostly about having to tell his master about why he was jealous of Raven. What a thing to say! He scrubbed at his face with a hand as if the action would somehow erase the last week and let him do it over. It was mostly because of that guilt, and his sense of honour, that he stood and walked to his master's side without question or any attempt at getting out of it. If this was what Barada thought he needed to overcome his issues, then so be it. Still, it wasn't without some trepidation on his part; it was going to hurt, after all, and his expression would have said as much even though he was doing his best to hide it.

Barada did not use an implement. He rarely did; it was not his style, and besides, given his large hands and his strong arms, he was capable of making a handspanking hurt plenty. Which was what he did. Rayan was sobbing long before it was over. And when it was, Barada made sure to provide plenty of reassurance because he could imagine how much it must have cost the boy to admit to his feelings and what kind of fears it might have caused him.

Rayan sat with his master for quite some time, content in the knowledge that despite having owned up to his emotions and openly shared them, Barada was not giving up on him. He had to admit that after having confessed, he didn't feel the burden of jealousy towards Raven as strongly as before. Perhaps this was what he needed to do in order to move past it. Time would tell, and he had plenty of it. Raven was in his Basic class and there was no changing that.

* * *

"I can't believe you, Raven," Lakhri said when they were back in the corridor, torn between amusement and exasperation. "You really and honestly aren't the least bit sorry for drawing your saber on that boy, are you?"

Raven wrinkled her nose. "Define 'sorry'?"

"You know what 'sorry' means," said Lakhri irritably. "Are you sorry? And if so, what for?"

"Well, it might have the same meaning, yet the depth of the sentiment could vary considerably," Raven thought but, given his tone, decided against voicing that for the time being.

"Yes, I'm sorry that I drew my saber on him, I should have come up with some other way of fighting back. The thing is, he's always picking on me, and–" Raven stopped talking for a moment. She wasn't sure if admitting that she couldn't match his wit was something she wanted made common knowledge. Raven might outmatch him physically, but Rayan was smarter than she was. The padawan cleared her throat. "Yeah, he's able to say things that hurt me a lot more. It's frustrating."

"I know it is," said Lakhri. "And yet, saying hurtful things to other people for no good reason will not get him far on the road to knighthood. You should leave it to him to deal with his own issues and focus on finding better ways to deal with provocation. If you don't want to spend half your padawanhood without your saber, you'd better take this lesson seriously. And you might want to put on a better show of contrition for Eeth than you put on for Rayan and his master because if you don't, you might just get to spend the rest of the week writing an essay on the dangers of aggression. Trust me, I've been there – more than once. It would be kind of nice if you were a faster learner than I was."

As if to punctuate Lakhri's comments, a passing master glanced at her missing lightsaber and then shook his head in silent disapproval. Yep, that was how it was going to be for however long Eeth decided to keep her weapon. Raven sighed. She knew Lakhri was right, yet sometimes people just got the better of her, and Rayan had a particular knack for it. "I will. Although the less time I have to spend walking around the Temple sans saber, the better." Or at least that was how Raven felt right now.

Eeth had dozed off some time after Lakhri and Raven had left, but he awoke immediately when they returned.

"Did you do as I asked you and apologised to Padawan Rayan?" he inquired.

"Yes, master," she replied, her eyes focused on her hands for a moment before looking up to meet his gaze. She had forgotten how hard it was getting around the Temple without her lightsaber, although it was all coming back to her now. Was it worth it just to get one up on Rayan? No. Not even close.

"Come here, padawan," Eeth said softly, opening his arms for a hug. When she had followed his invitation, he wrapped his arms around her and said quietly, "I know that being denied your saber must seem harsh to you. But I cannot let you get away with behaviour like this. It is unworthy of you, and indulging in it can lead you down a very dangerous path. I do not want this to happen, and that is why I am so adamant that you learn this lesson."

Between the ass-kicking she'd gotten from Lakhri and losing her lightsaber, Raven thought that if she ever even thought of doing anything like this again, there was something wrong with her. She hugged him, careful not to move too much lest she spur on another coughing fit. "I know, and I'm sorry. I should have just left." Raven wished she could go back and do just that, but it was impossible and now she would just have to live with the consequences.

"That you should have," said Eeth quietly. And let go of Raven as another coughing fit overcame him. The healers had assured him he would make a full recovery … but it was going to take a long time.

THE END

* * *

AN: Thanks for sticking with us, and we hope you enjoyed this story. Poor Eeth and Raven! Oh well, the life of a Jedi is not always going to be easy, or so Eeth might tell you. Keep an eye out for the sequel to this story: "Learning Self-Restraint" wherein Eeth makes his recovery, albeit not as fast as he would like. We appreciate all the comments and reviews, it makes us smile to know people out there enjoy what we create.


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